


Dog Dayz Are Gone: The Rejects AU

by BepisBoii



Category: Gorillaz, Powerpuff Girls
Genre: Blood and Violence, Domestic Violence, Explicit Language, LGBTQ Themes, M/M, Out of Character, Slow Burn, Suggestive Themes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-07-24
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:28:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 32,152
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23170066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BepisBoii/pseuds/BepisBoii
Summary: When you’re in a toxic relationship, there’s a breaking point. For 2D, it began when Murdoc returned home from prison. How was he supposed to trust him again after all he had done to him and the band? 2D was done, he done with all of it. So now he goes to start a better life for himself and joins a new band called “The Rejects.” But how will Gorillaz take this sudden change of pace?
Relationships: Ace Copular/Stuart "2D" Pot
Comments: 30
Kudos: 54





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> WARNING: This fanfiction contains some very sensitive topics about abuse and mentions of self-harm. Please read at your own discretion. If you feel uncomfortable with any of these topics, it’s okay to walk away from this one. I understand.
> 
> Also, most of this story is NOT canon. This is an AU where events play out differently than the official lore.

_Pop! Pop!_

Murdoc’s eyes drearily opened as he heard the loud popping noises coming from outside his bedroom window. At first he wondered if some kids were letting of fireworks again, until Noodle came bursting in through the door with a worried look on her face. 

”Jesus Christ, Noodle...” Murdoc mumbled under his breath, clutching his bare chest with his fist. “Are you trying to give me a heart attack?”

Noodle quickly hushed him, motioning him to come forward. Murdoc rolled his eyes, not really wanting to get out of bed at the moment. So he begrudgingly took his blanket and robe before walking up to the doorframe.

“What’s going on?” He said in a flaccid tone.

“I think we’re being robbed. I saw that the security system caught somebody sneaking into the garage.” Noodle whispered over to him. “Russel already called 999.” Murdoc looked over at her in surprise as he followed her down the hallway.

“Well, think that’s the first time that thing’s ever worked. Where’s 2D?” 

“I saw him get up to use the bathroom but I didn’t see him come out though, I think he just fell asleep in there again.” 

“So why didn’t you wake him?” Murdoc asked bluntly.

“I didn’t want to go inside and embarrass him. He can get sensitive to that kind of stuff.” Noodle replied. 

“Then why’d you have to wake me?”

“You’re a special case. Because whoever’s in the garage,” Noodle proceeded to point her finger in the direction of the door leading towards the garage with a slight smirk on her face. “is eying your precious Geep while holding a knife. Last time I checked.”

Murdoc’s eyes quickly turned from inquisitiveness to anger as he moved towards the baseball bat near the coat hanger.

“Oh hell no.”

Russel comes out from his room, cellphone in hand, and turns over to the two other band members in a calm tone of voice.   
  


“The police are on their way.” 

“Cool. Thanks, Russ.” Noodle said, giving a smile with a thumbs up. But suddenly the popping started again, but this time coming from the garage.   
  


_Pop! Pop!  
_

All of them just froze in place like statues. Total silence took over as they waited to hear for more. Nothing came for a few seconds until only soft steps and the jingling of keys echoed from the garage.   
  


“Shit..!” Russel cursed, taking the bat away from Murdoc. He made his way right next to the door while both Noodle and Murdoc started to freak out. 

“Oi!” Murdoc shouted out. Russel hushed him up.

“Russel, what the hell was that?” Noodle desperately asked. “What’s going on?” 

“A gun that’s what. They got a fuckin’ gun..!” Russel responded gruffly. He was about ready to fight. He was prepared for what was about to happen and he wasn’t going to let his friends die, unlike what happened back in Brooklyn all those years ago. 

“But how? How could someone even manage to get a gun into the U.K?” 

“Oh... Lots of ways, sweetheart.” Murdoc said with a smirk. “Not very good ways, but there are ways. I should know since my dealings with the Black Cloud.” 

Russel just rolled his eyes at Murdoc and looked back at Noodle.

“You can get a hunting rifle or shotgun if you have a specific license but handguns are illegal here in the U.K but there’s still some ways people can try to get them illegally. Just don’t try to follow in Murdoc’s footsteps.” 

“Hey...” Murdoc softly protested. 

“Okay,” Noodle said, going it over in her head. “Then why would think it’s a good idea to combat an armed guy with a baseball bat?”

Suddenly, band starts to hear an engine trying to start but failing. Russel by this point is fuming over this robber and promptly busts open the door. “Alright, that’s it..!” 

Noodle quickly lunges towards Russel, trying to stop him.   
“Russel, no!” 

“Ayo, dumbass!” Russel shouts. “Get the fuck outta here before I knock your face in.” He raises his bat up high, but before he could swing, he slowly takes in the image before him. He quickly drops his bat. Standing in front of him was 2D with his hair freshly cut and shaved into a whole new look as his dark, blackhole eyes reflected off the warm lights coming from inside the studio. He looked like a deer caught in the headlights, sitting on Murdoc’s brand new motorbike he got last Christmas, stolen keys in hand. In the other hand, 2D was stuffing away his butterfly knife. Russel also noticed that their ‘family’ car (if you could even call it that) had all four tires slashed out.

 _That makes sense as to what the popping noise was._ Russel thought. _But why would he do that?_

“‘D? What are you—“ Before Russel could say anymore the engine finally fired off and 2D simply sped off without a word down the highway. 

“Hey!” Murdoc shouted out towards him. He hastily pushed through the others to try and chase after the blue-headed bloke. After all he did just steal his bike. “2D, get your arse back here! Hey..!” 

That man didn’t car if he was running in his robe and underwear, he had to catch up with him. The other two went along with Murdoc, hoping to get some answers to their many unanswered questions. But alas, 2D was too quick for them and sped off into distance under the starry, midnight sky. Murdoc, who was now out breath, collapsed onto the ground just panting out. 

“Wait, wait...” 

Guess that security system didn’t work after all.

* * *

About three or four police officers showed up to the new Kong Studios that night at 3 o’clock in the morning. Everyone was tired and was desperately waiting just to be done with these stupid interrogations and simply go straight back to bed. Well, that’s at least what Murdoc thought anyway. He was just kind of dozing in and out of sleep by that point but these damn officers seemed to keep waking him up. Besides it wasn’t like any of this was new, 2D ran off a lot for many reasons. Sometimes he would be on a emotional trip, sometimes he was high, (not on painkillers, thank god, since he’s been four years clean. But he had been smoking weed lately.) sometimes he would just get lost, or he would just bring some person to have sex with. Now that, to Murdoc, was something 2D hadn’t done in a long time. Mainly because he got a couple of girls knocked up and later had to pay child support. But since those kids are either all eighteen or above eighteen by now, maybe he doesn’t have to worry about them anymore. 

_Who knows?_ Murdoc thought to himself. _I don’t see why everyone’s so worried about this shit anyway. He’s coming back, I know he will._

Russel on the other hand was actively talking with the police, just trying to be helpful in anyway that he could. But the officers kept asking the same questions.

“Do you have footage from the security cameras?” Yes. 

“Do you know what was taken from you?” Yes. 

“Did the suspect have a weapon?” Yes. And this continued to go on and on and on. He was just starting to get tired of it by this point. But then there came this; 

“Well, noting the fact that we just found a car around this neighborhood that matches the description of another stolen vehicle that was aiding in an armed robbery in Manchester. We believe that the person that stole your motorbike must’ve been a serial robber and thief that was involved in that incident. Now are you sure that this person isn’t someone you recognize?” 

When Russel heard this, something just sparked inside him. While he didn’t want to go out and rat 2D out if he was just having a bad time but in the end he did steal a bike and this wasn’t like him. He didn’t know why but he just had this sinking feeling in his gut about 2D. Something about this wasn’t normal. His behavior wasn’t normal. Not since Murdoc came back from Wormwood Scrubs anyway. But he had to report it, he already called them here and technically they were still robbed in the first place. Maybe this was his only chance to get some answers. 

“Actually, I do recognize him. He lives here with us. But I don’t think he was part of any big robbery.” 

“Alright, do you have any pictures of him, Mr. Hobbs?” 

Russel nodded.

“Yeah, yeah. Just lemme go get my phone. I think it’s still in the kitchen.” As he walked back inside the studio, Noodle walks in behind him grabbing his wrist firmly. 

“Russel, what the hell is wrong with you?” Noodle said angrily in a hushed tone. Russel just looked at her confused. 

“What do you mean?” 

“Oh, you know exactly what I mean. Why are you ratting him out? Are you trying to get him to go to jail?” 

“What? No...” Russel gently brushed her hand away, looking at her inquisitively. “If anything he might get a misdemeanor, I mean as long as Murdoc doesn’t press charges. It is his bike after all.” 

Noodle scoffed. 

“I can’t believe you. How could you say that? You and I both know Murdoc would press charges on him in a heartbeat. Besides 2D runs off like this all the time so it’s not like it’s anything new.” 

“You sure about that?” Russel asked as he softly shut the door behind the two of them. He then lead her over to the kitchen table where he proceeded to grab his phone. “I get what you’re saying but frankly, if he was simply running off to cool down for a bit, he wouldn’t have gone up and slashed all four tires of our little family car.” 

Noodle just silently stared at him before averting her angry gaze at him, her jet black hair beginning to cover up her eyes. Russel sighed as he sat down at the table. 

“Noodle, I need you to calm down about this.” 

“Why should I be calm?!” She shouted. “Why should I be calm when all this stupid shit is happening?!” 

“Noodle, come here.” 

“Why?” 

“Just come here and sit down.” Russel said firmly like parent telling off their child. 

“But—“ 

“Sit. Down.”

Noodle quickly sat down at the table like a child being put in timeout, looking down at her hands by this point. She knew she had angered him by that point and seeing Russel angry was not a pleasant sight to behold. And it was rare to see him this mad. 

“How old are you, Noodle?” Russel said, staring daggers into her. Clearly not in the mood to be doing this.

“Twenty-nine.” 

“Then start acting like it.” Russel’s voice, while not yelling at her was definitely booming and still at loud volume. After a few moments of silence he began to talk again with a lower and calmer tone. 

“Now. I know you and Murdoc don’t have the best relationship in the world. But you do acknowledge the fact that he came to you in Patagonia to make sure that you were safe, right?” 

Noodle gave a soft nod. 

“And didn’t he apologize to you and say that he was going to try and be a better man?” 

As Noodle was about to open her mouth to interject, Russel silenced her with the quick gesture of his pointer finger. 

“Did he or did he not?” 

“Yes, he did.” 

“And what has he done to try and prove that he’s trying.” 

Noodle gave a small pause before speaking. “H-He’s signed up for an AA meeting.” 

“Mm-hm.” 

“He’s cut off some of his alcohol intake.” 

“And?” 

“And he’s been going to therapy with 2D or at least... he was.” 

Russel leaned back in his chair in response. 

“What do you mean, ‘was?’” 

“Well, we don’t know when 2D’s coming back.” Noodle said softly, twiddling her fingers across the wooden table across every little crevice. 

Russel’s eyebrows furrowed at what she said. He leaned forward a little closer to her, now getting genuinely curious. 

“Why, is there a reason you think he’s not coming back?” 

“N-No, I...” She drew back her words hesitantly, pursing and biting her lips. Russel could tell that she was starting to feel the pressure but he felt there shouldn’t be any at all.

_She must be hiding something_. Russel thought. 

“Noodle, look at me.” He said more sympathetically. “Just tell me what’s going, okay. If it’s too personal, I won’t tell anybody. Okay?” 

“Oh, but you’ll show the police who 2D is, right?” Noodle blurted out, defensively. 

“Honey, you know I’m gonna have to at some point. Listen, you and I both know that 2D hasn’t been himself since Murdoc came back from prison. And you can chalk it all up to his newfound confidence or whatever but whatever’s going on here, that ain’t normal. Something about this just doesn’t feel right to me, Noodle. I’m starting to get real worried. So, I’m relying on you to tell me what’s wrong. Besides, you’ve been the closest thing to him right now. I’m not trying to get him in any trouble with this shit, but maybe if something is wrong or does go wrong and 2D’s involved, they can help him or at least help find him. Please, Noodle... Could you at least do it for me?” 

After a moment of silence she finally looked up at him, taking a deep breath in and out to try and prevent herself from tearing up. 

“Okay. So...” 

She slowly positioned herself upright in the chair and she let all of the words spill out like a small balloon holding air. 

“To be honest, I’m not really sure what’s been going on with him either. But what I do know is that over the past week, he’s been telling me all about how insecure he was around Murdoc now. How he didn’t really know how to feel about him anymore and how he’s been having these weird ass dreams about him lately, stuff like that. But then he did something that kind of concerned me...” 

Russel, listening intensely, nodded in consideration. 

“Okay, go on.” 

Noodle continued with a slight quiver in her voice as she spoke. 

“We were getting ready to go to lunch later with you and Murdoc, right? And we were just playing around with makeup and stuff like that. W-Well... we started talking about scars and he was surprised mine was still there from the Él Mañana incident. I just like, ‘Yeah, but it’s not as noticeable now because I put makeup over it.’ Then he asked me if I could show him how to cover his up. I thought it was cute at first expecting some story that he got it from his childhood or Murdoc or something. But then he showed me... all these small, tiny, little intricate cuts all over his arms. It was kind of scary. Worst of all, he didn’t even say where they came from. I-I think...” Tears began to well up in Noodle’s eyes as continued to look at Russel, who was trying his best not to look absolutely mortified. 

“I think he’s been hurting himself, Russ.” Then Noodle softly began to sob, not knowing exactly what to do with herself. Russel didn’t really know quite what to say. All except to get up, hug her tightly, and just hope that everything was going to be alright. Now he really needed to tell the police. 

“W-Why didn’t you tell us this?” Russel asked hesitantly. 

“I didn’t know how! This hasn’t happened before and it just kinda came out of nowhere...” As Noodle sniffled through her tears, she hugged him back while digging her face into his shoulder. “I’m so sorry. This is all my fault.” 

“No, no, Noodle. It’s okay.” Russel comforted her. “Absolutely none of this was your fault.”   
  


* * *

After the police had gotten their information and left that night, the rest of the Gorillaz band had their own investigation to do. They went searching around the house looking for clues as to where 2D could’ve planned on going to. But by this point, nobody could sleep. Maybe Murdoc, because it’s, like, almost 5am, but still. There were so many questions they had as to why 2D would decide to run away now. Or least why be this drastic about it. 

“Russ, please...” Murdoc begged. “Can’t we just do this in the morning?” 

“It’s been morning, Murdoc.” The big man replied, completely unsympathetic to the poor old man. 

“Why is everybody in such a rush to find shit? He’s coming back, it’s not like he’s dead.” 

“Well, might be if we don’t figure this out soon.” Noodle said, going off to her room to see if 2D might’ve taken or left anything behind. Murdoc simply shrugged it off and flopped onto the couch already trying to get comfy by curling up into little ball with his blanket that he took from his room. 

“Who shoved a squirrel up her arse?” Murdoc remarked with a grouchy face. 

“Murdoc, now’s not the time for this.” Russel scrunched his nose up in frustration and overall exhaustion at the situation. “I really think you should be more worried about this too. This is serious, man.” 

“Well, what do you want me to do about it? Huh?” Murdoc asked with the quick little jerk of his head to look up at the drummer. 

“You could start,” He said, ripping the blanket out from Murdoc’s grubby little hands. “by helping us look for clues.” 

“Hey, give that back!” Murdoc shouted as he tried to grab the blanket back, however Russel just simply held over hid head so Murdoc couldn’t take it. Classic. This made Murdoc get even more irritated than he was before and started to whine.

“The hell do you want from me?!” 

“To help us, man. Come on, you gotta know something about 2D. You’ve known him for like, what, twenty something years?” 

Murdoc groaned in response and stomped his foot like a cranky toddler.

“Just give it back, you twat! You’re starting to sound just like my therapist.” 

“Why do you even care about this so much?” Russel asked with a soft smile on his face, clearly starting to get amused. 

“Because it’s about as cold as an iceberg in here and I would to stay warm, please.” Murdoc replied in a somewhat snobby attitude. 

“But you have a robe on.” 

“Yeah, so? I’ve only my trousers on.” 

“Still, that’s a pretty warm robe to have on. Also I can see from right there that the temperature is 16°C in here.” 

Murdoc averts his eyes away from him as a way to still savor his pride. He walks back over to the couch and sits down, crossing his arms. 

“Murdoc, what’s the real reason?” 

The green man looks over at Russel for a second before rolling his eyes and sighing, finally calming down and admitted defeat. 

“It was a gift from 2D. It’s supposed to be one of those weighted blankets that help with anxiety or something like that.”

”Aww...” Russel cooed. 

“Shut up, this is exactly why I don’t like talking about feelings and shit!” Murdoc states while crossing his arms. “Every time I say something nice, you lot just don’t take me seriously.” He then softens quite suddenly after saying it.

“S-Sorry, I’m... I’m just getting really tired.” 

“Hey, man. I get it.” Russel then handed back the blanket to Murdoc with an more understanding expression on his face. “Sorry about that. It’s still kind of an adjustment to hear you... actually trying to be nice.” 

Murdoc gave him a half smile before frowning again, taking the blanket back. 

“It’s just... It feels so weird doing all of this. All this therapy and this weird AA crap, I... I don’t even know if I doing right. You know?” Then slowly sinks lower into couch as he starts to clutch at his knees. 

“I feel like shit.” 

“Don’t say that.” 

“But I do.” Murdoc emphasized. “I know I fucked and I fucked up tremendously. But...” His voice began to trail off as if reaching for something almost unreachable. “I know what happens next after this... I just don’t know if I prepared to face it yet. Let alone try and fix whatever’s going on with me and 2D right now. But by this point, I just want him to believe me.”

“Listen,” Russel started. “You have to realize that 2D’s been going through this whole rodeo with you for over twenty years. And from what I’ve seen. It’s been a very rough twenty years for the both you. But because of that, 2D’s not gonna just suddenly trust or believe in you again because frankly, you’ve used this excuse before.” 

“I know.” Murdoc protested, looking down at his feet.

“So how is this any different?” 

Murdoc just silently stared down at the floor with an exhausted look on his face before looking up at Russel. 

“Look, I shouldn’t even have to be telling you this. Didn’t you come with me to sign the papers in order to go to therapy?” 

Russel nodded. “Yeah.” 

“And you helped me sign up for the AA shit?” 

“Yes.” 

“So why should I have to prove it to you that I’m going?” 

Russel looked at Murdoc with a poised attitude and softly smiled at him. 

“I’m just making sure that you keep up with your word. I’ve been checking to make sure that you were doing what you said you were doing. And thankfully, it seems like you are.” 

Murdoc begins to sit up straighter with a puzzled expression on his face. 

“Why are you even checking? I-“ 

“Because I’ve been paying for your therapy for the last three months.” Russel stated. “As I was going to say, Murdoc, I think you’ve been doing a very good job so far. You just need to keep it up and I think you’ll be fine. Alright?” 

Murdoc’s crossed his arms back up again and simply huffed in response.

“Alright, thank you. But stop checking, alright? I can easily do this by myself.” 

“Okay. Just letting you know I’m here, man.” 

Russel then proceeded to get up from the couch and make his way towards the pantry. But some of the snacks in there were missing. 

“Murdoc, did you raid the pantry recently?” Russel asked inquisitively. 

“No, why?” 

Russel hummed in response. 

_Maybe 2D was in here before he left?_ He thought. But Russel just shrugged it off and then made his way towards the fridge, he found what he was looking for. He then turned back to Murdoc and asked. 

“Do you want a soda or anything, man?” 

Murdoc shook his head. Russel nodded and then took a seltzer out from the fridge and sat back down on the couch. 

“He’s been pretty reciprocal to me.” Murdoc began, causing Russel to pause mid-sip. 

“Hm?” 

“2D.”

Russel finally swallowed it down and nodded.

“Oh.”

“He keeps giving gifts like this blanket but at the same time, it seems like he also just doesn’t want anything to do to with me. He seems so much more distant now.” Murdoc sighed as he began to lean his head towards Russel’s shoulder. 

“I just hope he didn’t try to run away because of me.”   
  
All that Russel did in that moment was to sit there and listen to all of the things Murdoc told him until he just simply fell asleep. It was kind of comforting knowing that Murdoc was finally beginning to realize the error of his ways and actively trying to improve himself. But it was a little awkward considering the fact that Murdoc kept his head on his shoulder the entire time. Russel desperately wanted to move, but now he couldn’t because this man was now fast asleep. The only problem was about what the result was going to end up for 2D current situation and how well Murdoc was going to handle it. 

_Only time will tell._ He thought as he took another sip of his seltzer. But suddenly, Noodle’s horrified screaming came roaring throughout the studio from 2D’s bedroom. Both Russel and Murdoc heard the commotion a quickly ran upstairs to see what was wrong. When they saw the room they were horrified by what they saw. Everything was clean. Most of 2D’s clothes were stripped from his closet while his song journals and notebooks were neatly piled on his desk. And while 2D was a little more cleanlier than the rest of them, this was almost OCD levels of clean. Even more unsettling was that the whole room smelled entirely of bleach. But the most terrifying thing of all, was the almost three page letter left crinkled up in poor Noodle’s hands. She was shaking and crying so vigorously... What could 2D have written got Noodle out of all people so torn up and shaken about all of this? So, Russel and Murdoc read it, Murdoc insisting on reading it first. But by the time the both of them read it nearing the end, they were both shaken to their core. Murdoc immediately went rushing to the bathroom to throw up whatever dignity he had left in him and for the first time in years, Russel cried. After while they just sat there on the floor, hugging each other tightly, sobbing horrendously into each other’s arms. But they all knew from that point onward they had to get him back. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! So I did make some spelling and dialogue changes to help clear some things up. I hope this helps.


	2. The Note

It was 1am at the new Kong Studios. Everyone was all fast asleep except for one person, 2D. In fact, he hadn’t had a good night’s rest for about two whole days. Something was unsettling him. Ever since Murdoc came home from prison, 2D began having some conflicting feelings about him. Sure, Murdoc was definitely trying to do what promised, to try and be a ‘better man’ for him. But how could 2D believe him? Yes, Murdoc was going to his therapy sessions and he just signed up for rehab recently. So why was 2D feeling this uneasy? While Murdoc was trying to be kind to him, knowing him, 2D thought that Murdoc probably had some ulterior motive behind it. Honestly, he had a right to be suspicious of his actions. Especially when he was being so much more ‘affectionate’ to put it lightly. Murdoc try to hug him or pat him on the back sometimes, it wasn’t anything too horrible. Maybe a younger, more naive 2D would’ve appreciated this a little bit more. But as right now, he was having none of it. After all the things that Murdoc has done to him, 2D couldn’t just forgive him for his actions anymore. He was sick of feeling sorry for him. But at the same time Murdoc was actively trying to salvage whatever they had left. It was crystal clear. But 2D was sick and tired of doing this again. He felt like he was falling for the same trap again, where Murdoc would lift him up —saying he was going to change— to the point where 2D would feel comfortable enough to where Murdoc can just let him down again with even more lies or beatings or what not. He didn’t know what to think. 

_What the fuck is wrong with me?_ 2D thought. _This shouldn’t be so difficult._

But then something clicked. Almost like if a switch just went off in his brain. Then he sat up and thought about it, and after doing a little more thinking, he slowly rose from the bed and headed down the hall to the bathroom. He grabbed a pair and started chopping off his soft, semi-long hair. By this point, 2D’s mind was made up. He was going to try and find himself again. He wasn’t going to do this for anybody else but him. Like his therapist said, he deserved to be happy and content with himself. So when 2D was finally pleased with his now very short haircut, he made his decision. He was leaving home tonight. 

* * *

“Okay.” After about a good forty or so minutes of vigorous cleaning and packing, 2D was looking upon his new very clean room. It was almost like he was never even there. Although the only difference was that the room now smelled like it was completely engulfed in bleach. But in his defense, 2D couldn’t manage to find the carpet cleaner to get all the stains out. He just thought that since bleach was also a type of cleaner, the carpet could just soak it up and it would clean itself. No, big deal right? Despite the fact he literally poured it straight onto the floor and used up almost two entire jugs, he was sure it’d be fine. He then proceeded to make sure he had everything to go on his little trip. 2D came up with the conclusion that he wanted to try and go to the U.S. Since he knew Ace there and seeing how they were talking to each other more often on Discord. He didn’t see why Ace would object to anything. Besides he seemed pretty chill with a lot of things so far in their relationship so he didn’t see a problem as to why he couldn’t go and visit him. So he checked everything in his little backpack. He had his passport, his switchblade, (and the license for it) phone, clothes, wallet... everything seemed to be set. 

“Cool, now I just need to go get some snacks.” 2D swiftly grabbed his back headed down stairs to raid a little bit of the pantry. He didn’t grab anything to drastic. Maybe some nuts, some peanut shells, (he really liked to lick the salt off them) some dried fruit, potato chips, and some of his favorite sweets. He was kind of tempted to take some of Russel’s licorice that got from Australia, but 2D thought he’d already taken quite enough food for the road. But as he was about to leave the kitchen, he noticed that Murdoc’s bedroom door was wide open. 2D began to freak out at the fact that Murdoc could’ve seen him sneaking through the food or worse would’ve gone into the bathroom and seen all of his hair in the sink. All of those worries were somewhat relieved after hearing his soft snoring in the distance. 2D took a deep breath of relief as he slowly tried to walk away hoping that Murdoc wouldn’t wake up. But something was calling to go back there to visit him one last time before he left. So 2D silently watched as Murdoc slept peacefully, tip toeing his way towards his bedside. It was weird seeing Murdoc sleeping there with such tranquility and calmness. He was almost starting to regret his decision, but he had to remind himself as to why he was leaving in the first place. 

“Oh, Murdoc.” 2D muttered to himself as he softly fiddled with Murdoc’s hair. “Why do you always make it so hard for me to leave?” 

And with that 2D planted a soft kiss on his forehead and promptly left the room, closing it behind him. Then he decided to do something major. He had to say goodbye. So he grabbed some pieces of paper from one of his journals and wrote one big long letter, absolutely pouring his heart out into it. He even started to cry at some point. It was like he was leaving his family all over again, his very dysfunctional little family. He wrote down everything that he could think about in that very moment, told them why he was leaving and promptly telling them not to go looking for him. 2D added that part in, mainly because he knew that Noodle would now have some disturbing thoughts about his whereabouts, especially considering the fact that he stupidly showed her some of his old self-harm scars from Plastic Beach last week. So while he didn’t specifically say where he was going, 2D just decided to say that he would be far away from home. After he finished writing the letter, he put it neatly on the bed in his room before walking out and deciding which vehicle he had to take to the airport. But of course guess what had to go off, the security alarm. It started making this high pitched buzzing noise throughout the house and this made 2D freak out the hell out. He tried shutting off the alarm with the thermostat it was attached to and just started pressing random buttons. When that made it worse, he started smacking the damn thing hoping it would just shut off. 

“Stupid piece of garbage hardware! Why won’t you keep quiet just for me?!” 2D cried, until suddenly the system crashed onto the floor, breaking the control panel. 

“Oh, well that works.” 

“Hello?” Noodle’s voice rang out. 

“Oh to ‘eck..!” 2D cursed to himself. He quickly ran out the door, backpack in tow, promptly locking himself in the garage. He heard Noodle walking around the studio, clearly looking for something. He then heard her curse softly before hearing her feet thumping up the stairs, calling for Russel. 

“Well, shit.” 2D said to himself. “Now what?” He started trying to feel his way around the garage. It was very dark especially considering it was almost 2 o’clock in the morning. So he did the best he could with the limited amount of vision he had. He found the family car, which would’ve been ideal if he had more time to go back inside to find the keys. But since the door was locked, no luck. He then found the Geep which had been getting worse and worse at starting up the engine, plus the gas mileage sucked. But then there was Murdoc’s brand new motorbike. it seemed like it would run fine and it was a pretty luxurious ride. Heated seats, seatbelts, speakers on the sides to listen to the radio, it could also connect to Bluetooth. And luckily, the keys were still in the ignition, not started. 

“Perfect!” 2D exclaimed proudly, he quickly got onto the bike before realizing that the band was probably close to finding if they rode in the family car. What if they try to capture him or bring him to jail for stealing a bike? No, 2D wasn’t going to risk it. He then took the switchblade out from his jacket pocket and stabbed at the car’s tires. He then later stabbed all four of them just for good measure. After that was done, 2D he finally got back on the bike and tried starting the engine and lifting up the garage door. It was then that Russel came bursting through the door, baseball bat in hand. 2D just froze while looking at him, struggling fight the urge to cry. But then engine roared. 2D’s hands and feet began to suddenly work on their own, the motorbike speeding onto the highway, Murdoc trying to run towards him. It all felt so surreal because for once in his life, he was finally free. 

* * *

A quick buzz from 2D’s cellphone was the one thing that awoke him from his nice long nap to his almost eleven hour flight from London to L.A. 

“Hey, ‘D. Haven’t heard from you in a while so whassup?” It’s a text from Ace. 2D smiled and quickly typed back on Discord to talk with him. 

“I’m good! Just starting to land back in L.A. ;)” 

“wHAT, DUE” Another text comes from Ace. 

“*DUDE. affdgsgffuhdbb Why tf didn’t you tell me, b?!” 

2D chuckled at that one. 

“Kind of a split second decision. Sorry.” 

“You don’t have to be sorry, Stu. I’m glad you’re coming over. Is anybody else coming over?” 

“Nope. Just me. 💕” 

“Nice. :) What airport are you at?” 

“Southwest Airlines, I think??” 

“Cool, let me know when you land. I can’t to see you again.”

“Me too. I’ll call you later.“ 

“Bye, see you in L.A!” 


	3. The Question

2D took a deep breath of fresh air as he stepped out from the plane. Here he was in sunny California with nothing but a small backpack on his shoulders and cruel case of jet lag. But he was ready take the world on. 2D was born ready for this moment. This was the only chance he got into forging a new identity for himself. It was like a new chance at life, just thinking about taking that next step had him deeply excited for the world ahead.

“You can do this, Stuart.” 2D tried to remind himself. “Now where—?” 

“Hey, ‘D!” 

He quickly turned around, trying to look for who was calling his name. Once 2D turned over to the right of him, he smiled softly. There was Ace, waving at him with the same goofy smile on his face and holding up sign that read ‘Stewie’ on it. That was Ace’s affectionate little nickname for him. 2D walked towards Ace and gave him a tight hug which Ace reciprocated. 

“Hi, Ace.” 2D greeted him with a warm smile. “How are you?” 

“I’ve been doing great, toots.” Ace responded, putting an arm over his shoulder. “How’ve you been? It’s been a while.” 

2D chuckled. 

“Yeah, it has. But do you mind if we—?” 

“Oh! Yes, of course!” Ace exclaimed apologetically. “I’m sorry, I didn’t even think. You can tell me all about it when we get to my place. I’m sure you’re pretty tired after that flight.” 

“It’s okay, Ace. I’ll be happy to tell you later when we get to the car.” 2D reassured him. “This happens all the time when we jump from the European to North American tours.” 

Ace looked at him dejectedly, obviously very concerned about his new guest. But he nodded in agreement as they began to walk towards the direction of the parking garage.

“Okay... if you say so, ‘D. It’s a long drive from here to Townsville. Almost two hours.” 

“I’ll be okay, Ace.” 2D said with a tired smile. He then leaned his head on Ace’s shoulder, softly exhaling through his nose in a sigh of relief. For the first time in a while, he felt safe and comfortable while in Ace’s arms. 2D needed this. Since most of their interactions had been solely through talking online after Ace had left Gorillaz, it was nice to finally get to see him in person. As they were walking closer towards the airport’s exit, 2D couldn’t help but notice the television displayed at the baggage claim. 

“...In other news; Stuart ‘2D’ Pot, the lead singer and songwriter of the alternative hip-hop band Gorillaz, has been deemed missing as of yesterday evening.”

2D’s heart dropped. His breathing became quick and rapid.  
  
Oh god, do they know that I’m here? 2D thought. 

Ace noticed to 2D’s sudden change in mood and quickly jumped into action.

“Hey, ‘D. Are you good?” He then noticed and looked up at the television to see that 2D’s face was plastered onto the news. “Uhh... ‘D?” 

The broadcast continued.

“The band has put out a statement on social media saying, ‘We are deeply saddened by 2D’s sudden disappearance and we hope that eventually he’ll make it home, safe and sound. If anyone has recently come into contact with 2D or has seen anywhere within the London area, please contact us or the local authorities immediately.’ Gorillaz has stated early this morning that they will begin a QnA livestream on YouTube at 4pm British Time.” 

2D began to shake as he became more and more anxious. Ace quickly began to gather up on what was going on, now he was even more concerned.

“Stuart, what’s going on..?” Ace protested in a hushed tone. “Did something happen?”

“The police have already started their nationwide investigation into the Mr. Pot’s disappearance. They say that he was last seen riding an UltraClassic Harley-Davidson motorcycle down a London freeway at around 2am on Sunday but don’t currently know where he had been trying to go to at this time.” 

“Shit!” 2D exclaimed softly. He quickly ran out the exit door, Ace promptly running back after him. 

“Hey, hey, hey! Hold up now!” Ace quickly grabbed 2D’s wrist and yanked him back before he ran right into oncoming traffic. The former bass player turned around to a back wall of concrete were not a lot of people could see them. 2D tried to scream before Ace promptly covered up his mouth. 

“Now, 2D... Tell me calmly, what the hell is going on?” Ace demanded in a serious tone. 2D began to softly cry as Ace slowly let go of his mouth.  


“Th-They know..! They know where I am..!” 2D sputtered out. 

“Shh..! Calm down, who the hell are they?” 

“The band, the police, everyone!” 

“‘D, just tell me what happened. Why are the police looking for you? Did you do something?” 

2D continued to sob as his panic was growing worse. Ace just looked at him, getting increasingly more worried about what the circumstances might’ve been. 

“U-Umm... okay.” Ace quickly grabbed his satchel that was hanging from his left shoulder and grabbed a small beanie hat out from it before giving it to 2D. “Here, put this on. With your hair being cut that short nobody should be able to see it just from the hat. Also change your eye color, you can do that right?” 

2D nodded, changing his dark black eyes to his glossy white ones, although they looked a little red from crying so much. Ace put the beanie on his head and grabbed the singer’s hand. 

“C’mon, let’s get to the car before anybody notices.” 

* * *

By the time they were about an hour and a half away from their trip to Townsville, Ace started to ask questions. 

“Okay, now can you tell me what’s going on?” 

2D just stared off into the sky in silence for a moment before answering. 

“Something didn’t feel right when Murdoc came back... I didn’t really wanna say anything because I know you two are friends and all and—“ 

“It’s okay, I’ll just let him know that you’re staying here, you’re safe, and—“ 

“No!” 2D shouted, jerking his head towards Ace. “No, please..! You can’t do that!” 

“Well, why not, ‘D? From what it sounds like, they’re really worried about you, man. Hell, I’m starting to get worried about you.” Ace slowly turned his head to face him as he made a turn towards the intersection. “Just stop spinning around the subject and tell me what’s going on with—!” 

By this point something in 2D just snapped causing him to yell,

“I just can’t be around Murdoc right now, okay?!”   


“Why?” Ace shouted back.   


“Because he used to abuse me!” 

Ace quickly pumped on the breaks, causing a whole bunch of cars to honk behind him. Ace, while in a moment of shock, slowly turned into the emergency lane and put his hazard lights on, parking right there. He then turned to 2D in disbelief, who was breathing heavily with soft tears streaming down his face. 

“What?” 

“I-I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said—“ 

“No, no... Just tell me.” Ace was talking in the most serious tone that 2D had ever heard in his entire time of knowing him.   


“Where do I even start..? From the beginning?” 2D asked hesitantly.   


“I mean, you can if you want to. Just tell me whatever you’re comfortable with.” 

“It all started when Murdoc ran me over with his car. He put me into a coma when I was nineteen and then while he was taking care of me, put me in another care accident which got me out of my coma. That’s how I got both of my eyes to look like this... And for a long time, I thought he saved me. But then, when we were trying to make a film about our band here in L.A, he nearly strangled me to death...” 

“Wait, wait, wait...” Ace interrupted him, trying to keep tract of the story. “How long ago was this?”   


“About...” 2D stopped in order to calculate the time with in his head. “I don’t know. Gorillaz was only around 5 years old by the time Murdoc choked me. So about, I think, 17...18 years ago maybe.”   


The way how 2D said it so flatly made Ace’s skin crawl. Already, he wasn’t feeling good about the situation and knowing that this was only couple years before he and Murdoc met after the Powerpuff Girls show had ended, it only made the feeling worse. But 2D pulled the hat off that Ace gave him and just continued.

“But I was so naive so kept coming back to him every few years or so... except each time it got worse. He would start hitting me, punching me, kicking, slapping, you get the picture.”

2D stared off into space once more as he continued to ramble on as he got more emotional, Ace was just looking at him in disbelief. 

“But then he kidnapped and took me to that fucking beach...” 2D began to sob. “For the first time in my life I thought he was either gonna kill me, kill himself, or I was about ready to kill myself. I just watched as he drank himself a hole that he couldn’t get out of. But yet he..! H-He still..!” 

The words struggled to pour out of his mouth, he just felt sick every time he described this time in his life. But he just cried, just grossly sobbed as he desperately tried to hold himself together. Ace unbuckled his seatbelt and hugged him tightly, not wanting to let go. As 2D cried, Ace began to speak. 

“Did he ever touch—?” 

“No,” 2D interjected. “Murdoc never did anything like that. After all that he still had some dignity left in him.”

“Okay...” 

2D continued with his story. 

“So eventually, when I came back for Humanz... he started doing it again until I spoke up about it to the media. I didn’t give away too much. I just said I was diagnosed with Stockholm Syndrome by my psychiatrist and talked about some of the more recent things that Murdoc had done. It was only then when he started being nice to me. He just wanted me to shut up about it, probably because EMI was relying on him for Humanz to sell, so he needed to prove that he had a good reputation. I don’t know... I just suspected that he was planning something and didn’t know what. But then he said that he would be better... and while said it so many times before, he just seemed so genuine about it. God, I was so stupid...” 2D just buried face into Ace’s warm sweatshirt, letting all of his tears just soak into it.   


“No, Stewie... don’t say stuff like that.” Ace tried to comfort him.   


“But it’s true..!” 2D shouted, looking up at Ace with his bloodshot eyes. “How could I just fall for that same fucking trick every time? Even after I went to rehab to get myself clean and took a whole gap year just to prepare myself for this, I still got screwed over.” 

Ace just continued to tighten his embrace as they sat in his now very warm car, holding the poor man tightly as he sobbed in his arms. They just sat there for a moment just holding each other, both not wanting the other one to let go. Ace could only whisper sweet little reassurances to 2D, hoping that someway, somehow, they were getting to him, letting him know that none of this was his fault. But then after a few long minutes, they just sat there in soft silence, hearing the cars go by on the highway as they sat in the car that was still sitting there in the emergency lane. Even though no words were spoken after that, they still continued to hold each other. Ace was almost convinced that 2D had literally cried himself to sleep. But then he would feel his tiny movements while still cuddled nicely into Ace’s warm chest. He didn’t know why but he felt that there was this mutual understanding between the two of them. Now both of them never carried the same troubles or the same lives as each other but when Ace was younger he grew up in a pretty rough part of the neighborhood. Back then when he was a teenager and throughout his twenties; he was poor, abandoned by his parents, and was even homeless at one point before he really tried to take acting and music seriously. Back then, Murdoc was almost like the father he never had growing up. But now, he didn’t really know what to think of him. Was he surprised? Yes. Was he disgusted by what 2D had told him. Absolutely, but part of him just couldn’t deny that he did have some really great and fantastic memories with Murdoc. His thought process was now starting to get off track but the point was, was that both of them had a mutual understanding of what it feels to be hurt by someone you care about. But now Ace has something new to care about, 2D’s safety. He still didn’t know exactly what was happening but he had a pretty good idea as to what was going on. But right now, 2D was going to be his top priority. Suddenly 2D began to shift out from their long embrace and slowly fell back in his seat, sniffling and wiping his runny nose.   


“Feeling any better?” Ace asked softly.   


2D shrugged.   


“I think so. But I still can’t shake this feeling that I have.”   


“About Murdoc, I’m guessing.”   


“Yeah, I know he said that he’s gonna try to be a good person now. That he’s going to be better. But I don’t know if I should believe him. Sure, he’s going to therapy and what not but I just feel like he’s got this big grandiose plan that’s gonna bite me in the arse later. You know?”   


Ace nodded in response.   


“I get it. Trust me, I’ve been let down by too many different people in my life. But this is different, Stu.” Ace said firmly. “From what it sounds like, he’s been doing this for many years. What he needs to learn is that his actions have consequences and that people can’t simply forgive just like that. We all change and grow and that’s a part of life. And if he can’t see how much he’s been hurting you, then goddamn it, we’re gonna have a big problem. However...”   


Ace turned to look at the blue haired man one last time before turning off the hazard lights on his car.   


“I don’t think you’re being to bright about this either. You can’t just run away from your problems and expect for them to just go away. I did that for a long time as a young kid, and trust me, ‘D there’s only so much you can run from before it comes back to bite you back in the ass. Right now, you got the police looking for you and now you got the rest of your family— who didn’t seem to be involved in your guys’ little debacle to begin with —are now getting worried about you too. Those are good people, Stu. And I think you’re doing them a great disservice by leaving them behind to deal with this whole mess you dropped right in front of their doorstep. But again, I can’t blame you for doing that either.”  


Ace then began to drive back onto the highway, giving a painful sigh of frustration at himself. 

“I’m kind of torn. You were caught in a stressful, even down right horrible situation. I’m sure you didn’t know where to turn or who to talk to for a very long time. Listen, 2D... What I’m trying to say is that I’m just not sure exactly how I can help you in this situation. I know that’s not what you wanna hear but...”   


“But you understand why I’m doing it this way, right?” 2D protested, still talking in his soft tone. “Haven’t you heard or seen someone go through something like this?”   


Ace hesitated to answer.   


“Y-Yes and no. My mother wasn’t exactly the best person in the world. She struggled with mental illness for a really long time until she just decided she didn’t want me anymore. She never hit me or anything like that but from what I remember, our relationship wasn’t too great.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” 2D said with small frown. 

“But to get back at your other question, I think I know what you’re trying to say. You wanna try to be someone without Murdoc, right?” Ace asked giving 2D a small glance as he changed lanes. 

2D gave a nod.   


“Yes, I have to. I want to learn how to finally be me again. I want to find myself again, Ace. I thought maybe I could find that here.”   


Ace paused for a moment to process his thoughts. Then he finally spoke.   


“Tell you what, I’ll help you get back on your feet for a little while and then I’ll come back with you to England for a few days to help you readjust. But after that, you’re on your own. You can still call, text, or what not, but you gotta work some of this out alone too, okay? Just as much as you’re your own bonafide individual you gotta learn how to address your own personal problems too. Doesn’t mean you can’t ask anybody for advice but sometimes you just have to go with your gut.”   


Ace then turned to 2D with a smile, softly ruffling his hair.   


“Trust me, we’ll get through this. Don’t you worry, Stu.”   


2D gave a slight chuckle as Ace fluffed up his short blue hair, trying to reassure himself that things were going to be okay.   


“Alright, Ace. Thank you.”   


“No problem. Hungry?”   


2D nodded profusely. “Very.”   


“You wanna go to In ‘N Out before we stop at my place?” Ace asked.   


“Sure.” 


	4. The Discovery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of the account names that are listed in this chapter are completely fictional. These are ones that I made up myself.

The time was near. This was not the type of livestream that Gorillaz wanted to do but, the band had no choice but to do it at this point. Their friend, no, part of their family was missing and they needed to find him in someway. They knew that if anything, their fans might have clues as to where 2D was. Nobody was truly prepared for it, however. Noodle had been in a low mood since this morning, Russel hadn’t slept since yesterday, and Murdoc was trying desperately to keep it all together. After they read the letter last night, it was like their little family was slowly being ripped apart from the inside. Murdoc could only blame himself for that. He knew that 2D had been traumatized for years because of him, so it’s no wonder why he would leave the band.

_But why now?_ He wondered.  _2D had every opportunity to leave when I went to prison or when I contacted him for Humanz. So why now? I was keeping up with my promise, wasn’t I? To be a better man. So what else did I fuck up on? Was I just not good enough for him? Did I say something that rubbed him the wrong way? Did he—_

“Hey, Murdoc.”

Murdoc’s train of thought was immediately interrupted by Russel who put a hand over his shoulder. He knew what this meant.

“Right, I’m coming.” Murdoc tried to mask the insecurity in his voice as he got up from the kitchen table to walk to the living room couch. He couldn’t look weak in front of the camera, after all. He knew that if his fans saw even just a tinge of emotion from him, everyone would be all over it and he couldn’t have that. Not today at least. All he had to do was to just sit there and talk, like he always does in these type of QnAs. Once he sat onto the couch, Noodle moved slowly away for him to sit there next to her, all while not even looking at him. Murdoc sighed gruffly. Noodle had been very quiet all day, not really speaking to anyone. But now whenever Murdoc appeared, she would either stare daggers into him or would simply leave the room. He knew that 2D’s letter definitely had a huge effect on her. Both her and 2D were almost like siblings so it made since as to why Noodle would hate him now. Which was really sad, considering that he thought that their relationship had been somewhat fixed since they had that little spa vacation in Patagonia after he had left prison. But now, it was like he was starting from square one all over again. However, Murdoc knew that at some point this depressive episode would pass and they could be a little closer. At least she wasn’t completely pushing him away, right? As much as he wanted to Noodle to make her feel better, he knew that she wasn’t going to be in the mood for talking right now. So Murdoc persisted on keeping his mouth shut and sat in between her and Russel. He took a deep breath as he waited for more people to filter into the stream before they actually appeared on screen. Normally, Murdoc would have some sort of script prepared for situations like this but he didn’t know he would be able to construct it all. Sure, he’s made songs and wrote announcements like this before but nothing like this. It was like Él Mañana all over again, except this time it felt worse knowing that he directly caused this to happen. But the fans didn’t need to know that yet, not from Murdoc’s mouth anyway. So with a click on his computer, they were officially live on air. He once again made a deep sigh as he clenched his hands up in fist as he laid them on his knees, bouncing his leg up and down in increasing anxiety, hoping that one of the other band members would take the burden of speaking off of his shoulders.

“So, uh... hi.” Murdoc softly told to the camera. He saw the influx of responses coming from the chat room of worried people flooding in. “We really didn’t want to make this stream today but we thought that we’d have to let everyone know now before any rumors start circulating.”

_Fuck me... Why am I getting all nervous about this all of the sudden?!_ Murdoc thought to himself.  _It’s fine. You’re just overreacting, Murdoc. 2D’s coming home. He will come home. This isn’t unusual. It’s just his new thing! He’s been gone before. Not for this long but it’s only been about two days. He’ll be fine. He’ll come back like he always does. We just need to wait._

After trying to avoid contact with the camera for a few seconds, he looked back at it, desperately trying not to look incredibly nervous about this right now.

“2D... has gone missing. We don’t know where he is or where he could’ve gone to. Right now, we’ve got a police investigation going on. We’re actively trying to look for him in case he’s somehow still here in the U.K. But from the looks of it right now, it seems like he just up and left, without a word to us personally. And unfortunately... we don’t know why that is.” He looked down at the floor, slowly looking more and more worried. Noodle soon began to speak, interrupting what else Murdoc has to say.

“So today, we’ll be answering your guys’ questions about what we know so far. If we get any updates after this, we’ll let you guys know on our Twitter, Insta, our site... whatever we have, we’ll let you guys know.”

“Right,” Murdoc affirmed. “and please let us or the police know if you ever see him anywhere. Whatever you can do to help is greatly appreciated.”

Russel then stepped in with his soft, tired voice as he leaned towards the camera. Tears were just beginning to fall down his cheeks.

“And if you’re watching this, ‘D...”

Just as quickly as he said that Murdoc began to feel his own tears welling up in his eyes, causing him to immediately get up and away from the camera’s view. He was determined to not cry on camera today. Noodle began sniffling along too as Russel cried. All she did was scooch towards him, putting an arm around his shoulder.

“Please... please come home. W-We’re really worried about you, man. Just please come back home.”

* * *

By the time both of them arrived at Ace’s apartment, it was already 11:30am. 2D was pretty tired by this point, but at least he was fully content after all the food, the laughs, and the comfort that he felt from just being around Ace. He was in pure, unadulterated bliss.

“I got your futon made already, if you wanna rest for a little bit.” Ace said as he plopped their bag of leftovers on the small kitchen counter. 2D smiled as he took his backpack off and immediately flopped right onto the futon. Sighing peacefully.

“Thank you so much for doing this.” 2D replied, his speech muffled from having his face covered up by a pillow. Ace chuckled.

“No problem, Stewie. The pleasure’s all mine.” After putting all of their food away in his tiny fridge, he moved over to 2D and ruffled up his hair, smiling. “Now get some rest, you’ve had a pretty long day.”

As 2D flipped over to take his shoes off, he nodded.

“Alright, I’ll try. But after all that fun at In-N-Out, I might still be awake.” 2D said with a mischievous look on his face. Ace gave out another chuckle, leaning in to give him a kiss on his forehead. 2D closed his eyes, eagerly waiting for it but no kiss came. When he opened up his eyes, he saw that Ace was on his phone with a furrowed expression on his face.

“Shit.”

“What?” 2D said, now thoroughly disappointed about his now nonexistent kiss.

“A buddy of mine needs some help with something. Just stay here, I’ll only be a couple doors down, okay?”

And with that Ace quickly walked out the door, leaving 2D all alone in Ace’s apartment. He slumped back down in his futon after a few seconds, sighing softly.

“Did I just come at the wrong time? He seems to be pretty busy.” He muttered himself. But then he heard some loud talking down the hall.

Probably just Ace and his friend . He thought.

2D shrugged and decided it would be best if he’d get a little rest in while he was here. However, after a few minutes of trying to sleep, he noticed that they were getting to be pretty loud out there until suddenly it stopped. 2D tried to ignore it, even though this anxious feeling was only starting to bubble up inside him. So he continued his efforts to try and go to sleep. But right as he was about fall asleep, of course, there were some mechanical noises coming from the room two doors down. Drilling and whirring sounds echoing down the entire hall outside. Although for some reason they sounded familiar. 2D rustled around in the futon to try and get some proper rest, but the noises continued. By this point, his anxiety got the better of him. He got up, putting on his beanie that Ace gave to him and took off to go find him.

“Ace, you better be alright...” He told himself as he walked towards the door. Weirdly enough, the door was unlocked. But as he walked inside he saw a very familiar face standing there before him. 2D’s eyes widened, Ace was working on a girl he had met before. However she looked much older now.

“...Almost done.” Ace remarked as he screwed in a skin-toned metal plate, onto the girl’s arm. She was fair skinned with dark black eyes, maintained a toned complexion, looked like most of her dark hair had been ripped or torn out of her scalp, and most importantly, there was bullet hole that went through her right temple. 2D couldn’t believe it. It was Cyborg Noodle, there was no denying it. However he didn’t know who the really tall guy was. That guy was probably even bigger than 2D. But the bigger question was how Cyborg Noodle was still alive in first place.

“Okay, there! See, was that so hard to do, Cynth?” Ace exclaimed as if giving her a talking to.

“How about you shut your fucking mouth? I could’ve easily done it myself, Ace.” Cyborg snapped back. She seemed to be a lot more sassy than 2D remembered her to be, but that could be because Noodle turned her head into a potted plant for a bonsai tree. The tall blue man grunted at her, shaking his head.

“What? You were the one who called him here, not me.” Cyborg retorted.

“Come on, Cynthia. Lenny was just worried about you. Cut him a break, he just didn’t want you to spark up and get all glitchy again.” Ace said, as he walked back towards the door. He then noticed 2D who was still standing by the door. “Stuart? What are you doing out here? I thought I told you to stay put.”

“Sorry, I just couldn’t sleep. I heard all the yelling and weird noises and stuff that I was starting to get concerned.” 2D said, looking down at his feet. Cyborg quickly walked up to him, grabbed 2D’s wrist tightly. 2D yelped in pain. Ace immediately got defensive as he tried to pull her off of him.

“Cynthia, what the hell?! Let go of him!”

“Leonard, grab a hold of him.” The big blue man known as ‘Lenny’ slowly picked him up and threw him over his shoulders like a rag doll. 2D could hear Ace’s head collide with the ceiling. Ace groaned in pain.

“Ace!” 2D shrieked, now more worried about Ace than himself.

“Quiet.” Cyborg quickly yanked 2D in closer, examining him inch by inch causing her eyes to glow. Once she was done, they flickered back to normal. She looked up at him with a muddled expression.

“Son of a bitch, you are him.” She spoke softly, letting go of his wrist. “You can put Ace down now, Leonard.”

Lenny understood, putting Ace down gently. The two of them quickly ran up to each other, both frantically trying to make sure that the other one was okay. Cyborg curiously walked towards the two of them.

“It’s been almost ten years, 2D. Why are you here now? In Townsville of all places.” She looked over at him, completely confused. Once she moved towards him, Ace tried to block her with an angry look on his face.

“Oh no you don’t, you crazy bitch! You better walk away from him right now before I—“

She quickly unlocks her mouth gun function to keep Ace still as she continues to walk towards 2D. Ace quickly gets the message and puts his hands up in the air. Once she lowers her weapon, Cyborg hesitantly goes to touch his 2D’s face.

“I can’t believe this is happening. It feels like I’m dreaming.”

“I thought you were dead, Cyborg Noodle.” 2D responded, looking at her in disbelief. “I thought Noodle killed you.”

“Wait, wait, wait...” Ace interrupted trying to wrap his head around yet another bombshell. “‘Cyborg Noodle?’ 2D, what are you talking about? Her name is Cynthia.”

“Yeah, why do you keep calling her that?” 2D asked curiously. Now both of them were confused. Cyborg sighed out of frustration.

“Listen, both names are right. When I was born, I was implanted with some of Noodle’s DNA that my creator, Murdoc,had gotten from the Él Mañana crash site. So technically, I’m like her younger clone. But after I was somehow reactivated while sitting in a junkyard, I found this big guy who took me in and took care of me. I don’t truly know his name but he seems to like the name Leonard or ‘Lenny.’ So that’s what I’ve been calling him.”

Lenny gave a small wave as 2D turned towards him. Cyborg continued.

“So after hitchhiking for a while, we eventually made our way to Townsville, it was at that point I changed my name to Cynthia, however I couldn’t legally change it myself because I’m still about nine years old according to my birth records even though I was made to look like a fifteen year old girl by my creator. So Leonard helped change it for me, we made a band together, and here we are.”

“So, wait... are you fifteen now or—?” Ace asked, still confused.

“Oh no, I look like I’m twenty-four when I’m actually nine. But hey, at least it’s good to know that I can just call Chris Hanson in case I got a dude who tries to get a little too handsy with me.” She laughed jokingly. “Or I could just shoot them with my Uzi but unfortunately, that’s illegal.”

Cyborg then made her way towards her living room, motioning for the both of them to come inside.

“Come on, you two. Now I’ve got some questions of my own.”

* * *

“Okay... so @geckoco asks, ‘Will 2D’s disappearance affect any future Gorillaz projects going forward?’” Russel said, still reading off the questions from the chat room. The whole band had been doing this livestream for about three hours now and they were starting to get exhausted. But now they were feeling a little bit of closure with the amazing dedication that their fans gave them. They helped cheer them up with fan art, some people were already posting some interesting theories, (although some of them were quite ridiculous) and some had given them kind words of encouragement to keep looking for 2D. Right now, Gorillaz were more determined than ever to try and find him, especially with their fans at their side. Murdoc answered the question.

“Well, of course it’s going to affect our shit. I mean, we haven’t really done anything too major recently. But depending on what happens with 2D gone, it’s definitely going to affect us. Thank you for your question.”

Noodle went onto another question, looking for something to answer herself.

“@smolapricot64 on Twitter says, ‘Sorry if this is too personal, but did any of you notice any signs that something was wrong with 2D before he left?’ Umm...” Noodle laid her hand on her chin, hesitant on how exactly to answer it.

“Do you need me to answer this one?” Russel asked, trying to make she was still comfortable answering it.

“Oh no, it’s fine. I got it, Russ.” She then turned back to the camera to speak. “Umm... Fuck, I’m not really sure what to say. I guess all I can say is that 2D and I talked a lot before he left and he told some things that were very personal and I don’t feel like I’m at liberty to say them because... well, those are things that are meant to be behind closed doors and it just wouldn’t be right if I said them here. But it wasn’t like there were any big telltale ‘signs’ or anything, regardless, knowing what he’s been through over the past several years, I did see his mood and his personality change quite a bit. Even over the past couple of months, he changed and because of that I’ve grown extremely concerned for him and his well being. I just hope that he’s okay, wherever he is and that he’ll come home someday.”

By that point, the room got silent for a moment as everyone continued to awkwardly look about online for more questions. That was until Murdoc decided to break the silence by trying his best to put on a more energetic demeanor as he began to read the next question.

“Okay! Next question.”

Murdoc wanted to avoid reflecting more on the matter. He didn’t want to start feeling even more bummed out than he was already. He figured if he simply just slapped on a smile, things would be just a little more bearable. Murdoc could go ahead and cry about it later if he wanted to, but he wasn’t going to now. Especially not in front of everyone. So after scrolling through their IG comment section for a moment, Murdoc decided on the question.

“@caribooboo on Instagram asks... ‘Have you contacted anyone from 2D’s family yet?’ Unfortunately, no.” Murdoc said quite bluntly. He held his hands up in the air, already noticed that the chat was growing angry in his response.

“Now, hold on! Hold on!” Murdoc protested. “Before you grab your pitchforks and shout at me, I’d like to mention the reason I haven’t called his family yet...”

Russel just rolled his eyes at him while scrolling through the chat room.

_Here we go again._ He thought.  _Does he even realize how serious this is? He probably does... I hope._

Murdoc continued, putting his hands back down.

“The reason why I didn’t call is because most of his family’s dead. His dad died back in the late 2000s and his mom died a little while after that, I think. Hadn’t heard anything about her from 2D in a while, so who knows. 2D didn’t have any siblings, well, as far as I know of, but the rest of his family history is pretty unknown to me. Surprisingly, he doesn’t talk about his family much besides his parents. So... yeah.” Murdoc shrugged. “Don’t know if the police managed to get in contact with the rest of them or not but if they did, we’d know. Or at least I think we’d know...”

Murdoc then turned to Noodle in curiosity.

“I don’t know, Noodle. You think they’d tell us if they talked to his family or not?”

Noodle gave a small exhale out of her nose, followed by a smirk in response.

“I doubt it. The police wouldn’t just casually talk about that with us. And even if they did talk to them, I would think it would be the family’s decision to make if they’d want to talk to us or not.”

Murdoc nodded and turned back to the camera.

“Well, there you go. Next question...”

Murdoc and everyone else continued to look through each of their social media pages for any other questions. After a few minutes of scrolling around, Russel caught something in the chat that caught his attention.

“Oh damn.”

“What is it, Russ?” Noodle asked, still looking through comments on Twitter with her phone. Murdoc turned to look at Russel with a raised eyebrow.

“Someone in the chat said they found something about 2D.” Russel said, looking at them with wide eyes.

Murdoc was getting pumped up now. Maybe they now had a clue as to where 2D was in the world.

“Hey,” Murdoc said, now looking back at the camera. “whoever commented on chat just now that said that they found something, spam so we can see it.”

This caught the attention of Noodle who began to lean over Murdoc to see what was going on. They saw the fan spam their chat room with all their might.

“I think I know where he is! I just saw him not too long ago.”

Murdoc’s foot began to bounce rapidly in anxiety. This could be it. Russel looked at the comment intensely, curious about if what the person said was true.

“Holy shit.” Murdoc muttered under his breath.

“Russel,” Noodle started with a disappointed sigh. “are you sure it’s not just a troll or something?”

Russel shrugged.

“I don’t know. But we can’t not look into it, can we?”

“Why would it be a troll?” Murdoc said in a defensive tone. “Nobody would just lie that they found a missing person, right?”

Noodle shrugged her shoulders and hummed. “Ehh..? I don’t know, man. People lie on the internet all the time. I’ve seen some people do some pretty cruel shit, so I wouldn’t be surprised if someone did lie about this. Hey Russel, what’s their username again?”

“Umm... @southmaybe.”

“Okay,” Noodle then got off of the couch and sat next to Murdoc on the floor. “@southmaybe, do you have a photo or something to prove that you saw him?”

Now Gorillaz were waiting vigorously to here a response. After a few moments of not hearing from the person for a while, Russel spoke up to ask the user something else.

“If you can’t upload it here, do to have a Twitter or IG account you can post it on? You can just tag us in it.”

After a few more agonizing moments of waiting, a response finally came.

“Sorry, my pizza rolls were burning. But yeah, I just posted the picture on Twitter.”

Everyone then scrambled to Noodle’s phone to get a glimpse of what the picture was.

“Hey!” Noodle shouted. “Get your hands off my phone, why can’t we just look on the computer? I would think everyone would want to see it.”

They both backed away as Noodle went onto the computer and switched around the screen format so that way everyone in the chat could see what was on screen. She logged into Twitter and immediately went back and looked at all the comments on their most recent post. Then she found @southmaybe’s reply. 

“Okay, I got it.” Murdoc and Russel quickly scurried over to look at the picture in full view of everyone. As Noodle took a deep breath and opened up the fan’s response, looking at the picture very closely. The picture was of a girl and her elderly grandmother near thegate at an airport in London, but there in the background was the man himself, 2D, in line for going onto a plane to who knows where. This was definitely real alright. He had the same clothes on from the last time they saw him, the same shorn hair, the same face, everything. It had to be him. It took the band some time to process before one of them finally spoke. 

“@southmaybe,” Murdoc said firmly. “where was this?”

* * *

“So lemme get this straight...” Cyborg started, putting her clenched fists under her small chin, trying to process all that she had just learned from 2D and Ace. One person that she hadn’t spoken to in years and another person whom she had a love-hate relationship with. “So Murdoc promised you and the band that he would be a better person, which is something he’s currently trying to do, right?” 

The two men nod. 

“And because you still have a whole bunch of emotional shit to deal with him, you decided to come here and make a new identity for yourself.” 

2D nodded, frowning softly as he did so, expecting her to say something bad. But Cyborg just leaned back in her seat, grabbed a pack of cigarettes and put one firmly in her mouth. She used her finger to light the match and took a nice long drag from it. She chuckled as she puffed out all the smoke. 

“Yeah, that sounds about right. Little extra by how you did it but, alright.” 

“You do understand why he had to do it that way though, right?” Ace asked with a deeply furrowed brow, now getting up from his seat. ”He was—“ 

“I know why, Pinocchio. But I don’t think the whole letter thing was really necessary. That and the whole cleaning thing.” Cyborg shrugged, taking another hit of cigarette. “Honestly, I think if 2D just packed up his things, cut his hair, and then stole the motorbike, he would’ve gotten away with it with no police involved. Besides by the fact that he stole the bike but they would probably investigate for a few days and then left it.” 

2D looked at her with big, anxious eyes. 

“So you mean that if I didn’t do those things, they wouldn’t have looked for me?” 

“Well, according to you, you’ve ran off before. For all they would’ve known you could’ve ran off. And knowing them they would’ve been fine with that. I gotta admit though, Mr. Pot...” Cyborg then got up from her couch as she put out her cigarette and walked towards him. “You did better than me.” 

She laid a hand on 2D’s shoulder before sitting down next to him. 

“I couldn’t even escape Murdoc and the rest of your family. All they did was treat me like trash because I reminded them of something they didn’t want to remember. I didn’t even get a chance to escape, they just chopped me up and threw me away like I was nothing. Trust me, 2D. You don’t need them to define who you are. You are so much better than them, believe me.” 

All that 2D could do was try his best not to cry again. Cyborg gave a soft smile. 

“Thank you.” 2D said, leaning in for a hug. Cyborg hugged him back and ruffled his hair. 

“No problem, if you feel the need to vent about Murdoc or some shit. Talk to me.” 

Ace watched at all of this and began to feel kind of uncomfortable. He never saw Cyborg this welcoming or happy before. But maybe it was just because they both shared almost the same amount of trauma from Murdoc. That still didn’t shake the feeling that Ace had in his stomach however. Thinking back to what Cyborg said earlier, while he could agree that 2D was in a terrible situation, left in order to find himself, and maybe some of the things he did in his escape were a bit too much, but that didn’t mean that Gorillaz wouldn’t have cared for him if didn’t do it the way he did. They were all such a tight-knit, happy, dysfunctional family from what Ace had seen. There was no way they would do such a thing. Right? 2D then pulled out of he and Cyborg’s hug and smiled back at her.

“Alright, I will.” 

Ace made a soft smile before taking 2D’s hand.

“Well, I think it’s about time we get going. We’ll—”

Lenny interrupted with a loud grunt, the big mute man then signed over to Cyborg about if she wanted to tell 2D something else before they left. 

“Oh yeah!” Cyborg exclaimed. “2D, I almost forgot to tell you.” 

2D looked at her inquisitively and stood up from his seat on the couch. 

“What is it, Cyborg Noodle?” 

She then turned to Lenny and put a hand on his back before looking at 2D again. 

“Lenny and I started a band together! We’re calling it ‘The Rejects.’” Cyborg said, seeming very passionate about this new project. 

2D was only brimming with excitement at the news.

“Really?! That’s awesome! Do you have an album out or anything?” 

“Well, not yet. We just have a couple of EPs but we want to really make one. Ace over here is actually helping us with the writing process and managing some of our gigs.” 

Ace just looked away, scratching his head out of embarrassment. 2D turned to him in shock. 

“What?!” 2D exclaimed now smiling even more, he jokingly punched Ace’s shoulder. “You didn’t tell me this when we went out to eat!” 

“Y-Yeah...” Ace muttered hesitantly. “It’s been on and off, I’m not the only one who’s helping.” 

“But you do help us a lot.” Cyborg intervened. “In fact, you’re the one whose helped us the most, plus you got a great voice. Cut yourself some slack, man.” 

Ace shrugged, now even more uncomfortable.

“I think you and I need to talk later.” 

Cyborg frowned, now letting go of Lenny. 

“Why? What’s wrong now?” 

“I said we’ll talk about it later.” Ace spoke firmly. The two of them had a lot of disagreements with one another but this was different. For both of them it was something personal. Ace then proceeded to walk down the hallway and out the door. “Well, it was nice talking to you guys again. See you in a bit.” 

2D looked at Ace, confused. He wasn’t normally like this. But regardless of what he thought, he followed him anyway. 

“Umm... Goodbye, I guess.” 2D said, waving them goodbye as he went to go catch up with Ace. Once he was out the door, 2D turned to him and whispered. 

“What was that all about? Ace, are you okay?” 

Ace sighed.

“I’m fine, Stu. It’s just... me and her we don’t exactly agree on a lot of things. That’s all.” 

2D frowned. He could tell that it was more deeply rooted than that but he let it go for now. They were both tired anyway. Once they got back into Ace’s apartment, 2D flopped back onto his futon again, finally ready get some rest back in before anything else. Ace sat next to him, holding his hand gently. 

“You know I’m here for you, right?” Ace said in a soft voice while massaging 2D’s hand with his thumb. 2D chuckled. 

“Yes, I know.” 

* * *

Ace watched as the sun was just beginning to set on this poor little town he called home. What a mess he got into. His former bandmate came over for a surprise visit only to find out that the police are investigating his disappearance, he just found out that his best friend/father figure was actually a piece of shit long before he met him, and now one of his frenemies had a huge vendetta against the band he worked for a couple of years ago. Ace sighed as he took a small baggie full of grass from his pocket. He then rolled up the little herbs and put them in a piece of paper. To which he lit them on fire with his lighter, taking one huge puff.

_Thank god that reboot’s over. At least Cartoon Network won’t get on my ass about this shit anymore_ _._ He thought to himself, beginning to chuckle. 

“Whatcha chuckling about there, zucchini boy?” Cyborg said as she opened the front door to their apartment building. Her sudden appearance shocked Ace, causing him to choke on the smoke of his new makeshift blunt. He began to cough vigorously, tears welling up in his eyes. He then looked up at Cyborg who was now ‘trying’ to pat his back while laughing hysterically.   


“Y-You done?” Ace wheezed out as he wiped his eyes.   


Cyborg continued to laugh at him, helping him up to his feet.   


“Sorry..!” She sputtered out in between her laughter. “That’s why you don’t turn your back when you have a blunt in your hand.” 

Once she finally began to calm down, both Ace and her began to lean against the brick wall outside their apartment building, taking in the view. After a few moments of silence she finally spoke back up.   


“I didn’t mean to scare you, I just came by after you said wanted to talk.” She turned her head towards him and gave him a serious expression. “So... what’s going on, Ace?” 

Ace continued to look on at the sky and took another hit of his blunt. He sighed as he tried to collect his thoughts.   


“Look, I don’t know what kind of drama happened between you and Gorillaz in the past. But you don’t need to involve yourself in whatever the hell ‘D’s going through right now. You just don’t, Cynthia. And I suggest whatever the hell you’re planning to do. Stay the fuck out of it.”   


Cyborg just stood there in disbelief. She repositioned herself to face him fully in order to understand what words he had just vomited out of his mouth.   


“What?”   


“You heard—”

Cyborg knocked the blunt out of Ace’s hand, taking a hold of it tightly. 

“Don’t be a smartass! You haven’t even known guy for a whole fucking year and you think I’m the one manipulating him into joining my shitty band?!” She glared at him with icy cold eyes as she yearned to tear him a new one. But as she looked at him, Cyborg couldn’t help but sigh. ”Fuck, Ace... How high do you have to be in order to make that type of fucking conclusion out of our entire conversation earlier today?” 

“For your information, I just made that blunt. So I’m not that high, thank you very much...” Ace then turned away angrily, crossing his arms and going back to staring at the sky. Cyborg slides down into a sitting position with her arms hugging her knees. She runs a hand through what remained of her mangled hair and yet again took a deep breath before speaking. 

“Look... Whatever happened between me and Gorillaz had nothing to do with 2D to begin with. In fact, he was off in Guadalupe well shit went south for me. But when he came back to London and went all around on tours with us again, he fought for me. He knew that I didn’t deserve this. But at the same time, it wasn’t like he fought for me at every chance he got. Why? ‘Cause he was scared. Scared of what Murdoc, i.e; my creator would to him. But honestly, for as much as I hated everyone during the first five years of my life, I couldn’t be entirely mad at him. He and I had a mutual understanding of what it was like on Plastic Beach and because of that we could comfort each other, even if I glitched a lot and I just achieved true almost ‘human’ sentience. The more I was aware the more angry I became, but the more I got angry, I began to understand why a lot of things were the way they were. Until slowly, I wasn’t mad anymore. I had grown from it. Does it mean I’ll forgive them? Hell no. But I have a way better understanding of what was going on then now than I ever did before. So just to reiterate, whatever happened with me and Gorillaz has nothing to do with 2D. I wouldn’t force him to do something that he wasn’t comfortable with and neither should you.” 

Cyborg looked back up at Ace who was now staring down at her with soft eyes, listening intently. 

“I know you hate me but—”

“What? I never hated you. Sure I’ve disagreed with you but I didn’t hate you. Did you hate me?” 

Cyborg sat and thought for a bit before she spoke. 

“Yeah, only a little.” 

Ace frowned. 

“Well, that’s comforting.” 

“But I grew to like you. Sure, you’re positivity was jarring at times but over time, I realized that that was just who you were. You like helping people. Not only that but you’re great at it. It’s what you do best and well, if we’re being real here, you helped me. Kind of like how you helped me today with my circuit breakers.” 

She scooted towards him before pulling him straight down onto the concrete floor. 

“There. That’s a little better.” She said, giving him a small smirk. 

“You could’ve just asked if I wanted to sit down with you.” Ace remarked, giving her a soft glare while rubbed his backside. She chuckled before continuing. 

“Tell me, Ace. How much do you love him?” 

“Huh?” Ace gave her a confused look, his cheeks beginning to turn red. 

“C’mon, admit it. You love him. Again, I know you’ve only known 2D for about a year, year and a half or so, but ever since you went to go meet Gorillaz at the Kentucky Derby, you just gushed on and on about how much you couldn’t stop thinking about him. It was pretty cute, not gonna lie.” 

Cyborg couldn’t help but tease him about his cute little man crush from time to time. To her, it was fun to see him get all flustered like a freshman to their first homecoming dance. Ace sighed as he put a hand under his chin. 

“Yeah... I did do that, huh?” 

Ace began to shuffle his feet around looking at the floor beneath them, now feeling embarrassed. He crushed on him for a long time and always questioned as to whether or not 2D was actually gay or not, sometimes it was really hard to tell when he worked with Gorillaz. But by the time he went to leave for Townsville, 2D came out to him. Which was very nice but he felt there was a lot of pressure on him at that point since he knew the only other person 2D mentioned it to was Noodle, who was a lesbian herself. But besides that whole situation, now there was this. 2D was in his home and laying on his futon right now and he still didn’t know how to deal with it. By now, after all that he admitted to him, Ace was starting to feel guilty. Almost selfish about his desire to simply be with him. Ace then looked back at Cyborg with a sad look in his eyes. 

“Cynthia, am I being selfish? Be honest with me. Am I selfish for wanting to be in a relationship with him.” 

Cyborg could only stare at him for a while before answering. 

“You’re not selfish for just having a crush, Ace.” She started, slowly inching closer to him which meant that she was giving permission for Ace to lean on her shoulder. “However, 2D needs some time before he can even think of being in a relationship right now. He’s an old soul that needs time to heal and once he’s mostly healed or tells you that he’s ready to take that step, then you can tell him that you love him. Does that make sense?” 

Ace nodded, leaning into her shoulder. 

“I just wish I could make it all go away for him.” 

“I wish it was that easy.” Cyborg replied while giving a good pat on his shoulder. “You’ll be alright, Ace. Just don’t simp it.” 

“What? I’m not gonna simp.” 

“I’ve been seeing the signs and you’re already starting to simp, so stop it.” 

Ace chuckled. 

“Alright, alright. I will...” 

The two of them then get up and hug each other for a while. 

“It’ll take some time.” Cyborg said, smiling at him. “Okay? Trust me. I know you can get through this.” 

Ace smiled back as he began to enter back into the apartment building. The two of began to head upstairs to their rooms before Ace began to feel a buzz coming from his pocket. Now curious he pulled out his phone before noticing that a call was coming through. His face went pale. It was Murdoc. 

“What’s wrong?” Cyborg asked, now noticing the look on his face. “Are you okay?” 

In a moment of panic, he answered the phone. Without even saying so much as a hello, Ace could hear Murdoc’s angry tone of voice. 

“Where is he, Copular?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I submitted this way too early when it wasn’t finished yet. Sorry about that! 😅 So that’s why some parts have been changed compared to the original version of this chapter.


	5. The Call

The band couldn’t believe it. There was 2D, on their screens for everyone to see. It was plain as day. At least the band knew that he truly left England to go somewhere, however it wasn’t enough. Not for Murdoc anyway. So he leaned into the mic and asked strictly for the camera while Noodle and Russ continued to analyze the picture.

“@southmaybe, where was this?”

Murdoc didn’t know why but he had this weird aching feeling in his chest that seemed like it wasn’t going away anytime soon. Especially since 2D decided to leave with his motorbike. He hadn’t told Noodle or Russel yet but he had found something interesting on 2D’s laptop before the police took it away as evidence. Murdoc had found some message boards that were open and he decided to look through them. At first they were just normal conversations between members of Gorillaz, close friends, and collaborators. But then he found a set of private messages that 2D had been sending recently. Many of these messages were sent to his best friend, Ace and many of them were quite flirtatious. Murdoc wasn’t really surprised that 2D would attach himself to Ace so quickly. It did make him a little bit jealous of Ace, although he didn’t know if that was because of his pride or something else entirely. But Ace was a kind, mischievous, and attractive young actor with a pretty good head on his shoulders, who wouldn’t like him? He was certainly better than what he was at his age. By the time Murdoc turned thirty-nine, he was still dirt poor while living with his shitty excuse of a father. But regardless, he was still proud for Ace and his accomplishments. Although, Murdoc couldn’t tell what was sadder, the fact that both of them were dumb enough not to see their very clear attraction for one another or the type of pickup lines that Ace was using. But besides that, it was obvious that the two men grew very close to one another. Murdoc did find out later that they have a their own Discord server, but the police took the laptop before he could snoop further into it. Before he think about it any further, @southmaybe responded to them.

“I think it was at Southwest? Me and my grandma just got back from L.A to return to the U.K and we got someone to take our picture so we could tell my family that we made it home.”

“L.A?” Russel blurted out. “Why would he be going to L.A for?”

As he turned to Murdoc and Noodle, they seemed to have both realized something which made Russel even moreconfused.

“What? Am I not getting something here?”

Murdoc slowly looked at Noodle expectantly, hoping that she also knew who else lived in L.A.

“It’s Ace, isn’t it?” Noodle spoke softly, making eye contact with him nervously. “But that doesn’t make sense, he wouldn’t just...”

“Noodle, he’s the only other person who could’ve made contact with him.” Murdoc responded in calm tone.

“If he ever talked with 2D recently, he would’ve told us. You and I know that he wouldn’t just hide shit from us.”

“Oh yeah, and how long have you known him? Not even a year? Several months maybe...” Then Murdoc came up with a devilish idea. He would try to log into 2D’s Discord account himself from the computer they were using right now. “Hold on, I’ll even prove to you that he’s not as innocent as he seems. Just give me a second.”

Murdoc then proceeded to go onto the computer to promptly the audience on their livestream how he was logging into 2D’s account.

Russel protested to this by taking Murdoc’s hands off of the computer.

“Oi! You made me mess up.” Murdoc shouted towards him.

“You are not logging into his freaking account, man.” Russel said in response.

“Do you want to find out what happened to 2D or not? Because this is the only way to do it otherwise.” After Murdoc manages to wriggle his hands out of Russel’s tight grip.

“Also do you realize how easy it is to get into his shit? The man has used the same password for the past 12 years and every time he’s gotten hacked, he’d just add one number at the end of it and call it a day.”

And with that he continued to type the password in. Suddenly the account was now open. He then turned to the two of them and motioned to the screen.

“See? Easy.” Russel and Noodle just glared at him with Noodle immediately taking a stance on things.

“Turn that shit off, Murdoc. If anything you’re invading his privacy.”

“Well, that’s what you get when you leave your computer open for too long, I say.” Murdoc began to scroll through 2D’s messages meticulously as he tried to find some sort of answer. He knew that Ace was too kind of a person to just turn down on their offer, but then he found a small string of messages that were as recent as yesterday morning. Jackpot.

“See? Look here!” Murdoc exclaimed, motioning the band to come look at what he had found. Noodle and Russel quickly shimmied over to see what he was talking about. Murdoc then put his reading glasses on and read out the messages to everyone that was still present on the livestream.

“At 7:28am BST, Ace says ‘Hey, ‘D. Haven’t heard from you in a while so whassup?’ 2D says, ‘I’m good! Just starting to land back in L.A.’ Winky face emoji. Ace says, ‘What, due.’ Then after that he says with an asterisk, ‘Dude...’” Murdoc gave the screen a suspicious look, muttering curse words under his breath as he looked at the screen closer.

“Did Ace have a stroke in the middle of writing or some shit? The fuck is all this?”

“Murdoc,” Noodle interrupted. “it’s keyboard smashing. That’s sometimes how people text each other when they get really excited or shocked about something.”

“Then why not type one of those emojis you write to me all the time?” Murdoc protested. “At least then I wouldn’t be ready to call an ambulance.”

Noodle tried to correct him about this but knowing that talking about emojis during a time of crisis wasn’t really needed right now, she let him continue reading.

“Ace then says, ‘Why T.F. didn’t you tell—‘ Okay, Noodle.” Murdoc then turned to her in an act of confusion, starting to finally show his age. “What do the initials T.F. mean? Is that code for something?”

Noodle just sighed, trying to decide whether or not to laugh at Murdoc’s blissful ignorance or to still be mad at him for invading 2D’s privacy. But in a quick response, she just pushed him aside and said that she’ll handle with the reading bit. With now being able to see the screen, she began to read it aloud to the audience.

“‘Why the fuck didn’t you tell me, b?’ 2D says. ‘Kind of a split second decision. Sorry.’ ‘You don’t have to be sorry, Stu. I’m glad you’re coming over. Is anybody else coming over?’”

Noodle continued to glance around the page as she scrolled down to look at more messages.

“Yada, yada, yada... ‘Cool. What airport are you at?’ ‘Southwest Airlines, I think??’ ‘Cool. Let me know when you land...’”

By this point, Noodle didn’t really care anymore. All she wanted was answers as to where her friend was and whatever was going on between Ace and 2D certainly didn’t make her feel better or at least gave her the answers she wanted to hear. Noodle continued scroll down where she found a string of texts from Ace where he was trying to figure out where 2D was, presumably at the airport, but since 2D’s arrival gate number was the last thing that was put on his Discord, Ace has probably found him. Noodle gave an exasperated sigh.

But, she thought. That doesn’t mean that Ace would’ve known about 2D being dubbed missing, let alone that there was a police investigation. It’s only been about a day since he left London, the news wouldn’t have made it international yet. Would they?

“Alright, that does it.” Murdoc stated while getting up from his spot on the floor to grab his phone.

“Mudz, what are you doing?” Russel asked, looking at him cautiously.

“I’m calling him, that’s what.”

“What? No!” Noodle shouted. She then proceeded to get up to try and take the phone away from him. “You can’t do that!”

“Well, why the fuck not? If he picked 2D up at the airport and didn’t tell us, then something is definitely wrong.” Murdoc tries to push Noodle away so he could find Ace’s phone number. Noodle continued to fight him, pushing the old man back.

“You don’t deserve to call him! Not after we just invaded both of their privacy to the internet.” Noodle said, trying to still fight him off until she got an idea. She then turned to Russel, who was now standing up, and said in a low tone.

“Russ,”

“Yeah?” Russel replied.

“End the stream. Delete it.”

Russel nodded and quickly got up to abruptly stop the stream, that was until Murdoc quickly removed his grip from Noodle and swerved to run in Russel’s direction. The two bodies collided, causing both of them to fall onto the ground and break the camera that was sitting on the table. The feed was cut off. Everyone on the stream couldn’t see what was happening but they could hear a scuffle going on. But just after a few moments of shuffling about and some yelling in the background, the camera was suddenly turned back on. Murdoc, holding the camera and running away from Studio 13. He was seen running through an alleyway, panting and picking up his phone.

“I have to keep it going.” He muttered to himself. “And I’m not turning it off until I get some fucking answers.”

And with that he began to call Ace, eagerly awaiting to completely tear him a new one. There was no way Ace was going to get away with harboring 2D in his mind. He put the phone on speaker phone and watched for the number to pick up. Once it did, Murdoc unleashed his first question.

“Where is he, Copular?”

* * *

Ace stood there silently as he felt his heart begin to pound inside of his chest. He didn’t know what to say to him. After all that he learned about this man, how could he manage to keep a straight face, let alone lie to him. Cyborg gave him a confused look, noticing his shaken up face.

“Ace, are you good?”

Ace simply answered her by showing her who was on his phone. As soon as she saw Murdoc’s name on call, her eyes became wide.

“Holy fucking shit..!” Cyborg said in a hushed tone of breath. Ace covered up the speaker on his phone and whispered back to her.

“Yeah, ‘holy fucking shit.’ What the hell should I do?!” Ace began to breathe heavily, now in full panic mode. “I-I can’t go to jail again, Cynthia. I just can’t—!”

“And you won’t.” Cyborg remarked, holding his shoulders in place. She looked him straight in the eyes with vigor in her soul. This wasn’t the way how things were going to end with her friend and that’s how it was going to stay. “Listen to me, Ace. Whether you like it or not, you’re gonna have to lie.”

“Cynth, you know I can’t—“

“You’re an actor, goddamn it..! Think of it as a performance, but this time you’re playing the lead and you’re trying to convince one person. You know what improv is, right?”

Ace looked up at her and sighed, nodding his head, but as he was about to respond, Murdoc began to talk again who was getting impatient.

“Ace, where the fuck is he?”

Ace quickly fumbled around with the phone before answering, he looked back at Cyborg for reassurance. She mouthed to him ‘I’ll help you.’ Ace nodded.

“S-Sorry, It’s weird hearing your voice after such a long time. Anyway, who are you talking about?”

“Don’t play dumb, you know exactly who I’m talking about.” Murdoc stated with a snarl in his voice. ”Now where—“

“Murdoc, I literally have no idea what you’re talking about. Who’s ‘he’?” Ace tried to tell him off in a serious tone, but luckily Murdoc didn’t have to see the nervous look on face. He just hoped it sounded convincing. After a few moments, Ace heard him give off a very loud sigh.

“2D. I’m talking about 2D, Ace.” Murdoc said gruffly.

“Oh, yeah. I met up with him at the airport this morning.”

“Ace..!” Cyborg whispered angrily to him but Ace quickly silenced her with the flick of a finger. Ace gave a quick glance at her before continuing with his half truth.

“Why? Is something going on, Mudzy?”

Ace waited for a response before hearing exactly what he was looking for. He heard a somewhat befuddled Murdoc cussing to himself and some keyboard tapping before answering him back with an almost deflated tone.

“So you really don’t know what’s going on, huh?”

“Uh...n-no.” Ace answered, hoping Murdoc didn’t hear the stutter in his voice. He then tried to fake a smile in order to get that sweet sing songy tone in his voice to make it sound a little more convincing. “Are you two having problems again or something? Because I can surely give you some advice if you need me to—“

“No, no..!” Murdoc said, clearly sounding flustered. “It’s not that, unfortunately. Ace, I’m so sorry. I thought you knew.”

“Well, then spit it out, old man! What’s going on?” Ace shouted, trying his damnedest to sound cheerful.

“2D’s gone missing and there’s a police investigation going on into his disappearance. I found some of your messages on his laptop and it seemed to me like you were harboring him or something since you live in L.A and all.”

“Oh no.” Ace replied. “Well, why didn’t you guys tell me?”

Murdoc gave a nervous chuckle.

“Honestly, we were so focused on trying to find 2D, calling him, texting him... just everything.” Murdoc sighed softly as he spoke apologetically. “Ace, I’m so sorry—“

“It’s fine, Murdoc. I get it.”

“Alright. When you picked him up at the airport, how was he? Did he say anything to you?”

Ace took a moment to answer him in order to figure out what else he should say. Part of him really wanted to know the truth about 2D and Cyborg’s abuse from him but in order to do that, Ace would have to ease Murdoc into it slowly. So that’s what he tried to do. He started with a small lie.

“He didn’t really say much. He seemed pretty happy though when I picked him up and we went out to eat.” Ace tried to say calmly. “When did all of this happen?”

“This morning at 1AM.”

“O-Oh.” Ace said, genuinely being taken aback. He thought that the news had said that 2D had been missing since yesterday evening. “Then he’s been missing for a while, yeah?”

“Yeah, the police said that he was missing pretty quickly. I think they deemed him missing by 3 o’clock this evening.” Murdoc replied with yet another nervous chuckle.

Ace paused, trying to count in his head how long that would be compared to where he was in the U.S. But then of course he realized that it wouldn’t have mattered because the results would still remain the same. 

“So... he’s only been gone for 15 hours?” Ace finally asked. “Now I dunno a whole lot about laws in the U.K, but here in the U.S, you can only say that someone’s missing if they’ve been gone for more than 24 hours.” 

Murdoc grew silent for a moment.

“But isn’t there an exception for those kinds of things?” 

“Well, yeah. But 2D’s obviously not below the age of eighteen, Murdoc. Unless, I got something wrong—“ 

“No, you’re right.” Murdoc admittedly told him. He sighed heavily over the phone as he began to explain himself. 

“Look, from our perspective... the way that 2D wrote the letter and considering the circumstances that took place before we found it in the first place... it was all just too bizarre. Even for him. So we just got really concerned for his safety and his well being. That’s all.” 

“Okay,” Ace said, now starting to sound somewhat annoyed. “but that still doesn’t explain why the police dubbed 2D missing about 9 hours earlier than what they would normally do in a case like this.” 

“W-Well...” Murdoc stuttered. “From the way it sounded, we thought that 2D was trying to—“ 

“What? Kill himself?” Ace blurted out. By this point he was starting to get angry. In his mind, Ace felt that Murdoc was actively trying to dodge his questions in a different direction. And he didn’t like that feeling one bit. But judging by the tone in Murdoc’s voice, he seemed a little taken aback by his comment. 

“What? No.” He said assertively. ”Ace, where the hell is this coming from?” 

Ace, quickly realizing that he was starting to lose his cool, tried to calm down and decided to tell him upfront about all of the things he’s been feeling lately. 

“Listen, Mudz. I’m gonna be real with you. 2D told me some pretty concerning things about his relationship with you. Things that I haven’t heard of before. Things that happened before we met...” 

“Ace—“ 

“And don’t say that shit didn’t happened.” Ace interrupted. “Because clearly something did happen between the two of you over the past twenty years.” 

He sighed as he tried to keep his composure together. He just needed to hear from Murdoc and get some kind of closure in this situation. Cyborg did try to motion for Ace to stop the call but Ace didn’t listen. 

“Murdoc, I’m begging you. Please be honest and tell me the truth.” 

Murdoc just sat there, deciding whether or not to let him know about these incidents, let alone be honest to whole world about what he had done to 2D. But ultimately he came up with the heart wrenching choice to tell him the truth. If this was going to help him be a better person, he had to do it. Murdoc already fucked up so much already, this was his only chance to redeem what part of himself and dignity he had left. But as he was about to speak, he heard Noodle shout out in his direction. 

“Murdoc, I’m not saying this again. Turn it off.” 

Murdoc cursed to himself as he tried to stop Noodle and Russel from possibly ruining the conversation. But it was already to late. Ace could faintly hear Noodle on the other side, now even more confused. He heard Murdoc trying to reason between the two of them. 

“Guys, you don’t understand! I—“ 

“No, Murdoc. Turn that shit off. We’re done with the livestream.” 

Ace felt his sweat run cold. He felt betrayed and used. The whole band had been recording him and their conversation this whole time and he didn’t even know it. Not only that but his call was being put out there into the world in front of thousands of people. In his mind, if that was how Murdoc was going to play, then Ace was going to completely drag his name into the mud. Besides, if there was one thing that the internet was good for, it was spreading drama.

“You’re recording me?!” Ace shouted into the phone. “Murdoc, what the fuck is wrong with you?!” 

“Ace, it’s not what you think.” Murdoc tried to plead. Ace refused to listen.

“Well, what should I think?” Ace snapped back to him. “You obviously don’t trust me enough to tell you the truth! Is that why you decided to pry through our messages?!” 

“Ace, please—!” 

“No..!” He screamed, now beginning to shake in anger. “I’m done listening to your excuses!” 

Cyborg tried to step in, trying to take Ace’s phone away. 

“Ace, I think that’s—“ 

“Shut up!” Ace then turned his attention back to Murdoc and the rest of the band. “Murdoc, what the hell have I ever done to you?! After all that we’ve been through, I thought I could trust you..!” 

Tears began to well up in the young bassist’s eyes as his feelings began to bubble up towards the surface. He clearly wasn’t acting anymore. 

“D-Do you know what it’s like to have a grown ass man, crying in the passenger seat of your car?! I had to pull over just to comfort him, Murdoc!” Ace continued to shout as his words got more and more slurred as he cried helplessly into the phone. “2D told me all about what you did to him... The choking, the kidnapping, drugging, punching, kicking, slapping, and what not. Nobody, and I mean nobody should’ve gone through what he had to go through..!” 

“So you’re just going to take his word over mine, is that it?” Murdoc retorted. 

“Actually no, because 2D wasn’t the only person who you decided to shit on.” Ace then turned to Cyborg, wiping the tears from his face temporarily. “Hey, Cyborg Noodle. You wanna talk to him?” 

He could hear the confused tones in the band members voices as he handed the phone to her gently. 

“Go on, introduce yourself to the entire fucking world.” 

She hesitantly took the phone and watched as Ace paced around the hallway before picking up the phone.

“Umm... this isn’t how I wanted to start things off but, hey.” She said nonchalantly, trying her best not to sound awkward. She heard someone take Murdoc’s phone away before speaking into it aggressively. 

“I thought I fucking killed you.” Noodle barked at her. 

Cyborg began to smile a little more once she heard that famous snarl in Noodle’s voice. Yep, it was her alright. She decided to play along while Ace got himself together. 

“Oh hey, sister~!” She jokingly said in a sickly sweet tone. “How’s it going these days?” 

“How the hell are you still alive?”

Cyborg gave a loud chuckle into the phone. 

“Honestly, I don’t know either.” She replied. “What I do know is that I did end up at an L.A junkyard at some point and before I knew it, I now have my own band. But you don’t care about that, do you..?”   


“Where’s 2D?!” Noodle shouted, while Russel tried to calm her down.   


“Oh, Noodle...” Cyborg said, snickering to herself. “Why should I tell you guys anything?”   


Russel tried to intervene, taking the phone away from Noodle.   


“Because it’s—“ 

“‘Because it’s the right thing to do?’ Really? Because from my understanding, beating people up and committing attempted murder is wrong. But that’s exactly what your band did to me, isn’t it?”   


“Cyborg, I never tried to do any of that shit.” Russel replied firmly. “We both know that.”   


“Yeah, and you and I both know that you never tried to do anything. If anything you just walked away when I cried for help.” Cyborg sarcastically snapped back at him. “C’mon, let’s all just face the facts! You only wanted to get rid of me, because I was attached to something that none of you wanted to remember. But then when you realized that you couldn’t just throw me away, so you tried to kill me instead. But 2D was different. Instead of hating my guts, which he had a obvious reason to... He tried to help me. We bonded together in a way. All over past trauma that we had over Plastic Beach. We cried together. He even talked to me when my head was pulled off and made into a flower pot. My point is, he at least tried to forgive me. But none of you even wanted to give me that chance.”   


Cyborg stood there silently, waiting for any of their replies. But none came. She kind of expected this, but part of her at least hoped that they’d at least say something. Whether it was mean or apologetic or not. But of course, nothing. She gave a hearty laugh before speaking back to them.   


“Geez... Well, fuck you too, I guess!” She then handed the phone back to Ace with her other hand pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration.   


“Take it, Ace.” She said, a little more quietly this time, her laugh now dissipating. “I’ve had enough with this shitshow.”   


Ace just watched as Cyborg walked away to her apartment. He then turned around back to his phone and simply said to Murdoc.   


“Murdoc, I gave you a chance to tell me the truth. But don’t be surprised if I don’t contact you for a while. I hope you’ve learned about something tonight.”  


And with that, Ace said his goodbyes before hanging up the phone and promptly blocking him away from his life. He felt himself beginning to shake again. But this time they were more violent, his breathing became heavy, tears were starting to form in his eyes again. Ace was on the verge of a panic attack. He hadn’t had one of these in a very long time. But he didn’t think that talking to Murdoc would bring them back up again. He could hear some footsteps coming back down the hall, when he turned to look, it was Cyborg again but this time with 2D in front of her. 

“Sh-Shit..!” He muttered under his breath. He tried to walk out the door to try and make it to his safe spot before 2D could catch up to him but it was too late.   


“Ace..!” The tall singer shouted towards him. Cyborg tried to block his way in caution.   


“Listen, 2D. Now’s really not a good time—“ However, 2D pushed her aside, making a straight beeline for Ace.   


“Ace, are you okay? What’s going on?” 2D said, trying to get a good look at him. His simply worry turned to concern once he noticed Ace was shaking. “Ace..?”  


“Please just go...” He replied meekly, trying his best to wriggle out of this spot he put himself in. Then 2D tried to get closer, to him touching his back.   


“Ace, what is going—?” It was only then that Ace truly panicked and quickly turned around, trying to slap 2D’s hand away but ended up slapping him square in the face instead. Which caused 2D to completely go into ‘fight or flight’ mode. As he freaked out in covering up his face. Ace simply shouted, 

“Go! Just go away!”   


But once Ace realized what he had done, he only freaked out even more.   


“O-Oh my god, I—! ‘D, I’m so sorry. I—“ 

But before Ace could say anything more, 2D quickly ran out of the building and into a road he wasn’t familiar with. Ace watched as his love run out the door. He wanted to chase after him but his body prevented him from doing so. All he could was stand there and scream his name before finally collapsing onto the floor. As Cyborg leaned down to hug him, he began to do nothing but sob uncontrollably on the dirty wooden floor. 

“Wh-What have I done..?” 


	6. The Memories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since some of these translations from English to Spanish didn’t translate well. I will put some translation notes at the bottom of the chapters. If you see this “*”, it means that there is a translation for that phrase. Also in this AU, Snake is non-binary, so thus their pronouns will be shown as “they/them/their” when describing them.

The night stars in the sky were barely visible from all of the other bright lights and signs decorating the city of Townsville. It would’ve looked very pretty if 2D hadn’t been running so quickly with tears in his eyes. With panic swirling around in his head, the tears streaming down his face, and the wind at his back, he simply ran as far as his legs could take him.  _Why did I have to come here?_ 2D thought.  _I should’ve just ran back to Crawley and never looked back. I wish mom and dad were still alive. Maybe they would’ve known what to do._ As he finally approached another street, 2D soon began to fall to his knees onto the sidewalk, panting heavily as he wiped the sweat that was dripping from his face. But as he sat on the sidewalk, watching as the cars passed him by, 2D realized that he had absolutely no idea where he was. Here he was in the dead of night, on the streets of Townsville with no one around to help or protect him. He was completely and utterly alone... or so he thought.

“Oye, hermano.”* Shouted a voice. At first, 2D thought that whoever was speaking wasn’t talking to him, until he felt someone poke his shoulder with a pointy object.

“You think he’s deaf?” Asked another voice in a more gruff yet high pitched sort of voice. 2D quickly turned around to face them, ready to bolt right into another alleyway. But as sat there, he got a good look at the gentleman before him.

The two green men stood before him but they definitely weren’t Ace or Murdoc as far as 2D could tell. In fact, he was pretty sure that one of the men was at least 4”3 and the other was way taller than him. The taller, more parrot nosed individual held both of their hands up in the air, signaling for 2D to stop doing whatever he was doing.

“No te preocupes hombre. Está bien. No vamos a lastimarte, ¿de acuerdo?”*

The tall green person inquired with the smallest hint of a lisp in their voice. They seemed to look at 2D with a solemn look in their eyes, almost as if they were willing to help him. The very short friend then whispered back to his friend in a very confused manner.

“¿Crees que es sordo, Snake?”*

“¿Qué? No, idiota. Probablemente ni siquiera sabe español.”* The taller one hissed back. 2D could only look back at the two people in utter confusion. He could only sit there awkwardly and wonder how he should respond, trying to remember the phrase. The taller individual could only respond again, looking at 2D with concern.

“Umm señor? ¿Necesitas una ambulancia o algo?”*

Once 2D finally remembered the phrase, he managed to let out a response in scared, horribly broken Spanish.

“N-No hablo español...”*

The taller one sighed before smacking the back of the smaller man’s head.

“Ow! Whatcha do that for, Snake?” The smaller green guy shouted, rubbing the back of his head.

“I told you he didn’t speak Spanish, Lil’ Arturo. But you didn’t listen to me!” Snake said to him, with a icy, sharp glare. Snake then turned to the blue haired singer with a soft look in their eyes as they lent an outstretched hand towards him. “Sorry ‘bout that, man. You alright?”

2D looked up at them and nodded shyly, taking their hand.

“Y-Yeah. Thank you.”

As soon as Snake lifted the poor fellow up, 2D noticed that they were a lot shorter than he thought. They at least came close to his chest. Snake looked up at him in curiosity, eyes open wide. 2D didn’t seem to notice their gaze and proceeded to look around the area.

“Oh geez... I really ran far, didn’t I?” He muttered to himself. He then turned to Snake and Arturo with glossy, black eyes. “Umm... where am I?”

After a moment or two, Snake managed to snap out of their mindset as their eyes trailed up and down at 2D with an embarrassed look on their face.

“Y-You’re in Townsville—”

“No, I know that. But where am I here?”

Arturo chuckled at Snake who continued to stare at 2D’s stature.

“Sorry about my friend, amigo.” He replied with his thick Latino accent. “They haven’t been in front of such an attractive guy, in a long time.”

Snake quickly turned to their friend angrily, their cheeks were flushed a bright lobster red.

“Arturo, ¿quieres saber a qué sabe el concreto?”*

Arturo began to laugh, holding his stomach as he did so.

“¿Qué? No es mi culpa que estés actuando súper sediento frente a él.”*

Snake could only pull their friend by the collar of his shirt, only vaguely muttering and pointing at 2D.

“¿No lo reconoces? Este es el tipo del que Ace estaba hablando.”*

Arturo’s eyes went wide, quickly looked back up at 2D, shouting,

“Wait, you mean he’s-?!” Snake quickly put a hand over their friend’s mouth, silencing him.

“Shut the fuck up.” Snake said firmly, revealing more of their lisp the angrier they got. They turned back to 2D, sighing in frustration. “Sorry, you’re just a lot taller than I expected.”

2D smiled softly, shaking his head at them.

“It’s okay. I get told that all the time. Don’t worry about it.” 2D reassured them as he fiddled with his fingers nervously. Snake nodded towards him, clearing their throat. 2D didn’t know why but he had the feeling that these two strangers weren’t just simply talking about his height.

“Umm... anyways, you’re in the Little Tokyo part of Townsville. Do you need any directions or something or..?” Snake said with a furrowed brow.

“O-Oh no, umm...” 2D began to drift off in conversation, now more occupied on looking for a new place to hide. Snake and Arturo noticed the terrified look in his deep dark eyes. They both knew that something wasn’t right about this man. So Arturo took it upon himself to try and keep him calm.

“W-We work just over by this 7-Eleven that’s connected to the mall.” Arturo blurted out. “The mall’s closing right now but our store’s open 24/7. You wanna come inside? We can probably get you some food or something if you’re hungry. Then we can try to figure where you’re needing to go to, okay?”

2D thought about for a little bit. He didn’t have Ace’s beanie hat on him when he ran, which sucked for him because that was the only thing keeping his identity even remotely hidden and there was most likely going to be a lot of cameras there anyway. But it wasn’t as if he could just go back to the apartment or just book another plane ticket to somewhere else. Mainly because: One, he had no idea where he was. And Two, plane tickets going from California to somewhere like Timbuktu was incredibly expensive. Hell, he took out at least $530 out of his bank account just to book one whole flight with no breaks in between. Plus, he didn’t really want to see Ace right now. So none those options would work. However, there was another problem, he didn’t know these people in front of him. They might as well could kill him if they wanted to. But they were the only people around that came to help him around this city, so 2D then came to the reluctant decision to go ahead and follow the two men inside the 7-Eleven.

“Well... alright.”

Arturo gave him a big happy smile as he and Snake lead the singer towards the gas station.

“Cool.” He stated. The three of them walked along sidewalk and into the 7-Eleven to which 2D was promptly greeted by bright fluorescent lights hanging from the ceiling. The store seemed pretty empty, besides for all of the coolers lining up with drinks to the small hotdog rollers on the other side.

“You can pick anything you want.” Snake said while looking down at their phone, presumably texting someone. “Just don’t get too crazy.”

2D nodded at him and proceeded to get a small pizza slice from the heating rack beside the hotdog rollers. He then tried to pat himself down trying to feel for his wallet. He was somewhat shocked that nobody tried to steal while he was running but he managed to find at least his credit card and tried to hand to either one of the strangers.

“H-How much do I owe you?”

Arturo and Snake gave him a confused look before Arturo broke the silence.

“It’s on the house, man. You can take it.”

2D just looked at his boxed up pizza slice and then back at Arturo in hesitation.

“Really..? I can just take this?” He asked, now in a more curious tone.

“Yeah.” Arturo reassured him, nodding his head. 2D just stared at the two for a few moments before trying to come up with a decision.

“Are you sure that—?”

“Listen, dude.” Snake interrupted, slowly walking over towards the singer. “You looked like you were about to pass out when we saw you. I say, just take a breather, grab a couple of Bang energy drinks, and just sit down. We’ll take care of it.”

“But what about your boss?” 2D argued. “I would assume that your boss might still be here, right? Wouldn’t they be mad?”

Snake shook their head.

“We’ll take care of it. Trust me.” As they went over to pat his shoulder, 2D flinched. His face contorted into a look of terror. Snake, being obviously taken aback by the man’s sudden movements, quickly took their hand away. Now even more concerned. “Woah, dude. Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”

2D just stood there, being absolutely frozen in fear with his hands shaking violently as he clutched the now lukewarm pizza box. His heart was absolutely racing with adrenaline and panic. Once he noticed the expressions on Snake and Arturo’s faces, 2D could feel himself beginning to tighten up like a turtle wanting to retreat into his shell.

“N-No, I’m fine. R-Really...” He replied, looking at the both of them anxiously.

“Are you sure—?” Before Snake could ask him anything else, 2D just made his way to the nearest counter before shouting,

“It’s fine! I-I’m fine, really...”

He then went to one of the coolers and got himself a Red Bull before marching over to one of the chairs to sit himself down near the window. This was definitely strange territory for both Snake and Arturo indeed. First, while on their break they see some guy running for his life before collapsing on the ground in front of them, but even after he had ran so much, they would think he would be a little more hungry, or at least would try to actually eat. This poor man was just eating in tiny little bites, almost as if he still felt guilty eating it after they said it was okay for him to get more. But then there was that overreaction to Snake patting his shoulder. The two friends slowly turned and stared at one another. This was certainly not a normal situation. The two of them then started whispering to each other.

“You think he’s a hostage?” Arturo whispered. Snake looked back at him, rolling their eyes.

“You watch to many crime shows, mijo.” Snake replied bluntly. They then turned back towards the blue-haired man with a concerned look in their eyes. “But...”

The parrot nosed individual watched the man intently as he continued to nibble on his slice of pizza. Snake then gave out a sigh before pulling out their phone.

“I can’t help but think that Ace is involved in this somehow.” As they dialed Ace’s phone number, they began to walk near the break room. “I’m not gonna call police just yet but try to keep this guy calm while I try to figure this out. Okay, Arturo?”

The short man nodded back to them as made his way towards the now mysterious looking 2D.

“You got it, boss.” He replied, now turning his sights to the singer. Arturo quickly copped a seat as he tried to look like he was casually skimming through his phone. 2D flinched as he heard Arturo quickly plopped into his seat, still on edge from what happened between earlier. The short man turned to him in confusion.

“Hey, hey, hey. Relax, dude. I was just checking to see how you were doing.” He said with his hands up in the air. Then Arturo spun his chair around to completely face 2D. “You okay?”

2D nodded back to him nervously in response, continuing to take tiny bites out of his slice of pepperoni pizza. Arturo knew that Snake was probably still back in the break room so he tried to strike up some conversation with the man in front of him.

“Sorry, that I hadn’t introduced myself yet. My name’s Arturo. What’s yours?”

At this point, 2D stopped chewing his food and just stared at the glass window in front of him with his big dark eyes before he could come up with an answer.

“S-Stuart.” He replied softly.

Arturo quickly made a mental note of it in his mind, now he just had to keep him talking. Snake might’ve been right about him watching too many crime shows but he knew a hostage situation when he saw one. At least that’s what he wanted to believe.

“Okay. So Stuart, excuse me for asking but... is this your first time in America?” He asked, leaning his hand on the counter.

2D gave him a furrowed brow before turning his attention back at the window.

“No, actually. This is the first time I’ve been in Townsville, though.”

“Ah, cool. You know anybody here?”

“Not a lot of people. Just...” 2D’s voice trailed off as he began to think back to Ace again. “N-Nevermind.”

“Nevermind?” Arturo said in a somewhat joking manner. “I don’t know anyone but that name.”

“Oh no, no. It’s not—“

“I’m just kidding. Come on, who do you know?” Arturo asked with cheeky smile. “I’m pretty sure I can tell who used to live around here and who’s new. So what’s their name?”

“Why should I tell you?” 2D said, now starting to get defensive.

“Hey, man. There’s no need to—“

“Lil’ Arturo, you better not be messing with customers again.” A big voice bellowed. Then out from one of the doors on the other side of the room, comes a large burly man with a nice curly beard, shaggy ginger hair that seemingly covered his eyes, and tattoos absolutely covering both of his arms. 2D saw how Arturo’s eyes lit up like a light towards the big man with a smile on his face. To the singer the man looked pretty intimidating.

“Ay, Big Billy!” The short Latino man shouted excitedly, jumping down from his seat and hugging the behemoth.

“Heya, pipsqueak. How’re you doing?” Billy said as he ruffled the little guy’s hair. He then looked up to see the blue haired man sitting there staring at him. “Sorry, was he bothering you?”

2D shook his head.

“No, we were just talking. That’s all.”

“Oh okay.” Billy then straightened his posture, showing off his wide frame before clasping his hands together with a smile. “Now, are you ready for you back piece?”

2D’s eyes widened as his eyes turned a bright milky white, clearly bewildered.

“W-Wait, what? Do you not work here?”

Billy’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Arturo just stared at 2D’s eyes in fascination.

“Uh, no. Not at the 7-Eleven. You ordered a tattoo from me, remember?” Arturo then tugged at his shirt, signaling to Billy that this wasn’t the person he was looking for. “Oh. You’re not my client, are you?”

“Unfortunately, no.” 2D responded.

“Oh, okay. Sorry about that.” Billy said with a big goofy smile. 

“It’s fine, dude.” 2D replied. “We’re cool.”

“Okay, this is a cool conversation and all but, did you not see what happened to his eyes?!” Arturo exclaimed, pointing at saluted. “How did you do that?”

2D blushed out of embarrassment, his eyes going back to black.

“S-Sorry, it just kind of... naturally happens.”

Billy nodded as he stroked his big red beard, chuckling.

“Okay, sweet. So kind of like Sedusa when her eyes get all glowy and stuff.”

“‘Glowy?’” Arturo repeated one confused tone. “Since when did Sedusa’s eyes ever glow? If anything they changed color like this guy.”

“No... I’m pretty sure they glowed.” Billy reiterated, still with a big smile on his face.

“No they didn’t, Billy..!” Arturo shouted.

“Yes they did, kiddo...”

2D just watched as they saw the two bickering over who was right and who wasn’t. He then saw Snake come back into the room with another person coming out with them. The other green man yelled at the two employees which seemed to have stopped the madness. 2D couldn’t tell what this guy was talking about but so far, Arturo and Billy were silent for a little while. But alas, they began to argue yet again, causing the new man to bicker along with them. Snake could only sigh as they walked towards 2D, who was completely dumbfounded by this point that he now knew six different green people. 

“Is this normal for them?” 2D asked as he stared at the three men. Snake chuckled.

“Yeah, but I wouldn’t worry about it too much. Grubber’s got it under control.” Snake said as they leaned against the counter, watching as the trio of men yelled at each other relentlessly. The two of them awkwardly stood there before 2D tried to break the silence.

“So, Mister...” 2D stopped mid-sentence, suddenly realizing that he never got this person’s name. “U-umm...”

“Oh, excuse me.” Snake interrupted, promptly letting the blue haired man shake their hand. “The name’s Snake Ingleberry. Sorry, it’s been kind of a long night for me.”

2D let out a small nervous giggle as he accepted their handshake.

“I bet it has. F-Forgive me if I sound a little rude while saying this but,” 2D said with a small stutter beginning to come through in his voice. “I honestly didn’t expect you to actually be called Snake. From the way it sounded, I thought it was just your nickname.”

“Oh, yeah.” Snake remarked. “I got my name legally changed a couple years ago due to my transition.”

“‘Transition?’” 2D let the word slowly sink into his mind before saying anything. Once it finally clicked, his expression quickly changed from puzzled to mortified. “Oh my gosh, have I been calling you the wrong thing this whole time..?!”

Snake could only snicker as they let go of 2D’s hand.

“What? Oh god, you’re completely fine. You didn’t know.”

“Wh-What are—?”

“My pronouns are they/them. It’s okay, man.” Snake tried to reassure him. “Don’t look worry about it too much. If it makes you feel any better, you only said it wrong once.”

“A-Alright.” 2D said, starting to feel somewhat relieved. But he still felt really embarrassed about the situation regardless. “Well, you look great.”

Snake smiled before sitting on top of the counter next to the singer.

“Thanks. The boys are still getting used to it but so far, I think we’re doing alright.”

“How do you all know each other by the way? You guys seem really close.” 2D said as he turned to watch the three men finally start to break up from their little quarrel and get back to work. Snake chuckled slightly as they laid back against the window, reminiscing about the past. 

“Oh we’ve known each other since we were still in high school. But that’s not how we met.” 

“Oh?” 2D turned to Snake, now starting to get curious. “I thought you would’ve known each other here.” 

“Nah, we all met as child actors.” Snake said with a smirk on their face. “We even worked at the same studio together.” 

“You were actors? All of you?” 

“Yep.” They said, a big bright smile spreading across their face. “I was only fifteen at the time. Ah, those were the days. The long hours, the rehearsals, the line meetings... The ‘90s were definitely something back then.” 

2D gave out a chuckle as he scooched closer to Snake. 

“Was it fun?” 

“Hell yeah, it was! But...” Snake’s smile slowly started to mellow out as they began to remember the very reason why they couldn’t do it anymore. “If I ever tried to back to acting now, I don’t think anyone would take me, especially now that I’m out.” 

2D frowned at their answer. 

“Well, I’m sure that you’ll be able to find something somewhere. I mean, the world’s way different now than what it was back in the ‘90s. I think by this point people would just except for you are.” He watched Snake look back down at the floor, fiddling with their hair. 2D should’ve really taken that advice for himself too but his gut was telling him otherwise. He knew how Murdoc was like back home. How would he react if he just came out to the band right then and there. Noodle was already fine with him being gay since he came out to her not that long ago. But he didn’thow Russel would’ve reacted. He never really talked about serious topics such as this, but 2D would think he would accept him. But how are they going to understand that he was gay when they know that he’s dated women before? Would they not accept him because of that or would just get confused? As 2D’s mind began to wonder he heard Snake call out his name, which finally got his attention. 

“You alright?” Snake said, giving him a slight furrowed brow in concern. 2D just nodded. 

“Yeah, sorry... I spaced out there for a second. What were we talking about?” 

“I was saying that only two of us still decided to continue acting. Arturo and my best friend, Ace.” As soon as those words began to trickle out of their mouth, 2D’s expression began to completely change. His skin went pale, his eyes changed to white again, this wasn’t good. Snake took notice and quickly sprang into action. “Woah, dude. Are you sure you’re alright?” 

Before 2D could try to keep himself together, he suddenly heard a car pull up into the parking lot. As soon as he saw who was coming out of the car, he froze. Ace came in, frantically stumbling out of the car with his beanie as he raced into the store. His eyes were puffy and red from all of the crying he went through earlier. As soon as he looked around the room, filled with surprised faces, he then turned to lock eyes with 2D. 

“Stuart..!” Ace shouted. As he began to make his way towards him. 2D’s face turned from being frozen in fear to slowly being engulfed by anger. He jumped of his seat, hugging himself as he tried to walk to another corner of the room. Ace tried to grab his hand but 2D pushed him away. 

“Fuck off.” 2D spat at him. “Why are you here?” 

Ace just stood there silently in utter disbelief. 

“Wh-What?” 

“You need to leave. I don’t wanna see you...” 

Ace continued to try and pursue him. He needed to apologize for what he had done, he just had to. 

“Stewie, please..! I’m really sorry, it was an accident, I swear.” As he continued to move in closer, 2D tried to push him back again, but this time, Ace wasn’t budging. This only further frightened 2D, causing him now to try to run. But as soon as Ace hugged him, 2D began to scream. Squirming and kicking and punching all around, wanting someone to help him. 

“Get off of me!” 

“‘D, calm down. It was—“ Ace was then interrupted by 2D’s head thrashing into his face causing him to let go in order to rub his now throbbing nose. “Shit..!” 

2D saw this as an opportunity to run into the corner of the store. While everybody else went in other directions in order to comfort the two. Arturo and Grubber went to go help a hysterical looking 2D while Billy and Snake tried to restrain Ace to keep him from trying to get close to the frightened blue-haired man. 

“Why the hell are you restraining me?! Snake, you’re the one who called me here..!” Ace yelled, now trying to break free himself. 

“We’re restraining you because we don’t want shit to go down.” Snake stated firmly. ”Clearly you guys can’t be near each other right now.” 

“But I—!” 

“Ace, right now, I think we should all calm our tits for a moment, okay?” 

Ace and Snake continued to lock eyes for a moment before Ace finally stops struggling and admits defeat. The only thing that can be heard in this quiet little 7-Eleven was the song playing from the intercom and 2D’s incessant crying being carried throughout the store. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRANSLATION NOTES:  
> *”Hey, bro.”  
> *”Don’t worry, man. It’s okay. We’re not going to hurt you.”  
> *”Do you think he’s deaf, Snake?”  
> *”What? No, you idiot. He probably doesn't even know Spanish. ”  
> *”Umm sir? Do you need an ambulance or something?”  
> *”I don’t speak Spanish.”  
> *”Arturo, do you want to know what concrete tastes like?”  
> *”What? It's not my fault that you're acting super thirsty in front of him.”  
> *”Don't you recognize him? This is the guy Ace was talking about.”


	7. The Moment

The store felt empty and barren. Aside from the fact that currently the only people present in that small, local 7-Eleven store were currently dealing with a situation they were not at all that familiar with. For starters they had one of their lifelong friends, someone whom they practically considered as their big brother, was clearly in a very emotional state. While on the other hand, they had a British man who was just sitting on the tile floor, bawling his eyes out over something that left a significant impact on him. What was worse was that nobody knew what exactly happened. Nobody in that store knew why this man was here or why he had such an extreme reaction when Ace tried to reconcile. What they did know was that this man’s name was Stuart, he and Ace obviously knew each other, and something clearly went awry. So there they were, standing there restraining the two men, just to make sure that nobody would try to kill each other. One side of the group, Snake and Billy, kept Ace on one side of the room while 2D stayed cooped in the other corner of the room while Arturo and Grubber tried to keep him calm. It seemed to be working but, of course the door’s charm started to ring and a customer soon entered through the door at the worst timing possible.

“Howdy, y’all.” A voice bellowed. Billy turned around to see who it was before promptly cursing to himself. It was a man by the name of Fuzzy Lumpkins, although he looked more of a monster than he did of man. From his fluffy pink fur that cascaded his entire body (besides his face and bulbous green nose) down to his ridiculous looking cowboy get up and Southern drawl, this man was usually quite the handful, but he seemed to be in a pretty good mood lately since he got married a couple weeks ago. But that only comes with a whole lot of annoying chatter about his honeymoon with his new partner and even more entitled antics. “I just picked up some gas but I thought that I could grab a little something-something for me and the— Ohh...”

The fluffy pink creature stood there trying to take in the scene he was just witnessing. For the first time in many years, Fuzzy was surprisingly silent for a couple of seconds before gritting his teeth and sucking in the thick tensioned air back into his lungs like he just witnessed someone break one of their arms right in front of him.

“Is this a bad time..?” He said as he tightened up his shoulders in slight embarrassment. Billy rolled his eyes and replied begrudgingly.

“I dunno. What do you think, Fuzzy?”

Fuzzy’s body then loosened, prompting him to just cross his arms and scoff.

“Well, there’s no need to get all sassy about it. I was just asking.” He then made his way towards one of the coolers before grabbing a couple cases of beer and carrying it towards the cash register. “Now, I’m just gonna grab a couple of things if you don’t mind. It’ll only be a minute. I swear...”

“It’s never a fucking minute.” Arturo muttered to himself. Fuzzy quickly turned around in a neck-snapping moment, aggressively looking at anyone who might’ve said something.

“I beg your pardon?”

“It’s nothing. Just wait there and one of us will get to you.” Snake blurted out, now slowly starting to get irritated by this whole thing. Fuzzy just huffed as he turned back around, waiting. Snake then met their gaze with Ace, noticing how he was still staring at the floor, his face being visibly downtrodden at the events that just unfolded. It made Snake feel a little sad seeing their best friend in such a state. It made them remember about the times the two of them spent together up on the catwalk or in his dressing room back when they were filming for the original Powerpuff Girls, up until the day Ace’s mother came for a surprise visit. After that, Ace just wasn’t the same. Ace was no longer the happy-go-lucky kid that he always was and Snake had to watch him slowly turn into depressed and more cynical version of the man they loved so dearly. It was devastating. Although to them, their best friend seemed to be doing much better than before. With his optimism slowly coming back and seeing him get the invitation to be in Gorillaz out of all things, Snake thought they would never have to see that solemn expression on his face ever again. But, here they both were.

“Billy, did you close the tattoo shop yet?” Snake asked in hushed tone. Billy shook his head.

“No.”

“Okay.” Snake then turned to their best friend with a solemn expression before kneeling down to him. “Listen, Ace. We’re going down to Billy’s shop and we’re just gonna talk. Just you and me, alright?”

Ace nodded silently, before taking his hand, and clutching it tightly along with the hat the he brought for 2D. As they both stood up together, Snake began to walk out the door before turning back to Arturo.

“Arturo, go ring up Fuzzy.” And with that one sentence, he walked out the door.

Arturo just groaned, beginning to walk into the direction of the cash register.

“Wait here, Stuart. I’ll be right back.”

2D only continued to sniffle and cry as he clutched at his knees, rocking back and forth. Snake stared at the blue-haired bloke through the window for a moment and let out a soft sigh through their nostrils, walking down the sidewalk to Billy’s tattoo shop for their little chat with Ace. As they he watched them disappear into the shop, Billy then walked towards 2D, grabbing a pack of to-go tissues for the poor man as he made his way towards the corner of the room. He knelt down and held the little pack of tissues towards him.

“Here you go, sir. You might want these.”

2D looked up from his lap, taking the tissues softly as he pulled out one to blow his nose with. Billy continued to sit down on the dirty tile floor with him, watching as he saw Grubber gently patted the singer’s back. The poor man soon stuffed the pack of tissues into his jeans as he tried to rub off the rest of the tears off his face.

“Th-Thank you...” 2D muttered softly to the burly green fellow. Billy just gave him a warm smile.

“You’re welcome.”

Grubber also entered himself into the conversation, probably trying to comfort 2D as well. Unfortunately, he could not understand him at all.

“What—?”

Grubber then proceeded to remove his hand from 2D’s back in order for him to turn the other way and cough, which made him sound like he was hacking up a lung. He cleared his throat loudly until a deep, scratchy voice could be heard dangling from his throat.

“Sorry, smoker’s lung. Happens from time to time.” Grubber said, staring at 2D with a deadpan stare. 2D just looked at him, not knowing whether or not he should laugh if he should be startled. He didn’t really expect that that was what his voice was going to sound like. But before he could reply to anything, Grubber continued to speak. “Anyway, I was just gonna say that you better be paying for those tissues before you leave tonight.”

“Grubber!” Billy exclaimed. This caused Grubber to let out a hearty laugh followed by some more coughing. 

“I’m just kidding, bud. Don’t worry about the tissues.”

2D gave a nervous nod towards Grubber, chuckling anxiously.

“Y-Yeah, alright...”

Meanwhile at the cash register, Fuzzy finally began to check out after getting a ton of snacks, beer, and some tobacco chews. But right as he was about to leave with his things, the pink hillbilly soon noticed something as he passed by the aisle. He managed to get a good look at the blue haired mystery man until something clicked inside his tiny little brain that made him want to investigate, digging his nose deeper into figuring out what was going on. Fuzzy then set his stuff onto the counter before marching straight towards Billy, Grubber, and 2D.

“I recognize you from somewhere.” Fuzzy stated, slowly twirling and pointing his finger at the tall British star. “Were you on TV once?”

2D quickly got up and tried to bolt before the two guys could try to hold him down. But before the man could even get to the door, Fuzzy grabbed him by the arm and yanked him back. He could already hear Arturo getting very angry.

“Ay, pendejo.” Arturo shouted aggressively. “Leave him the fuck alone.”

The short little green man paced his way towards Fuzzy and tried to take him down. But the pink fluffy monster stood his ground and shoved Arturo aside with one hand quite effortlessly while still holding 2D’s arm with the other in a vice grip. By this point, Fuzzy wasn’t really focused on the little man or 2D’s mortified expression, he just simply wanted to know if his thoughts were correct. 

“Hey, hey, hey...” Fuzzy looked the poor man’s eyes as his voice began to grow deep and low. “I’m not gonna hurt you.” 

“Well, you’re hurting me right now!” 2D shouted as he flailed about, desperately trying to free himself. “Let me go!” 

“Wait, I see it now.” Fuzzy said in a peppy tone, still holding onto the singer’s arm. “You’re 2D, ain’t you? Yeah, that’s where I saw you! You were on TV! A lot of people are looking for you. Whatcha doing here of all places?” By this point, Arturo managed to break himself free from the pink guy’s grasp and tried to tackle him to the ground. Billy and Grubber then sprung into action, both trying to pry Fuzzy’s hand away from 2D and trying also to prevent 2D from bolting again. Once they all finally got the overall wearing fluffy monster off of him, Billy began to notice how the tall lanky man stood eerily still. It was as if he had froze into place. Arturo, who was getting extremely mad at this point, soon pulled out his phone in frustration. 

“Okay, that’s it! I’m calling the police.” Arturo exclaimed as he began to dial 911. This caused 2D to quickly spring into action once more.

“What? N-No! You can’t do that!” 

“Yeah, man.” Fuzzy protested in agreement. “This ain’t none of your business.” 

“It became my business as soon as you walked into the room.” Arturo snapped back. “Besides! You were the one who started harassing him in the first place.” 

“Oh, c’mon! This is just a big joke, right? Y’all can’t be serious.” Fuzzy continued to argue. “Why do we have to get the police involved in this?” 

Arturo turned towards the pink fluffy hillbilly with a very angry expression on his face as he held his phone up to his ear, his finger hovering over the call button. 2D watched this unfold in utter panic of not knowing exactly what to do, so he just stood there waiting for any opportunity to open up for him to either deescalate the situation or wait until everything calms down. 

“Lumpkins , I will call the police if you don’t get out of here right now. This is the fifth fucking time you’ve instigated with other customers and other workers and I will not tolerate that shit today. ¿Comprende, amigo?” 

Fuzzy glared at the little man angrily as Billy and Grubber tried to pick him up in order to throw him out the door like a couple of bouncers.

“Just wait till I tell him about you.” 

“Oh yeah?” Arturo shouted. “Try me! I’m sure your new hubby’s gonna _love_ the fact that he’s gonna have to arrest his own spouse for both being an entitled Karen and assaulting one of our customers.” 

“Man, fuck y’all!” Fuzzy yelled, his face red with anger. “Y’all are being so damn sensitive over one simple question.” 

“And for that, I’m calling the police and your husband right now.” As Arturo went to touch the call button on his phone, 2D took this chance to try and snatch the phone out of his hand in a frenzy. However, Arturo managed to move his hand away from him, giving the singer a confused look. “S-Stuart? What are you doing?”

“Please..! Please don’t do it.” 2D mumbled as continued to try and grab his phone, but Arturo backed away from him yet again. 

“Whoa there. You alright?” Arturo asked in a worried tone. 2D stared at him with his wide black eyes as he tried desperately to reach for the phone once more but the little green man pushed him back. “Bro, seriously. Stop it. What’s up with you?” 

“P-Please, you cannot call them.” The singer begged. “You can’t call them here. You just can’t..!” 

“What, the police? I-I’m sorry, I just thought that you’d want Fuzzy off your back.” 

“And under any other circumstances I would appreciate it but—“ 

“But what?” Arturo inquired as he began to walk closer to 2D. “Stuart, my guy. What’s going on? Is what Fuzzy saying is true?” 

2D could feel himself beginning to hyperventilate, his chest beginning to tighten with each breath as his panic continued to rise. Arturo came up to him slowly, trying his best to calm him down.

“I’m guessing the police are looking for you. Right?”

The singer nodded as tears began to flood his already horrible vision. He only continued to panic, trying to find some sort of way to console himself. But when breathing slowly or hugging himself like he was taught in therapy didn’t work. He went back to the age old habit of scratching his fingers with sharp end of his nubby little fingernails. He just wanted the feeling to go away. He wished for everything to go away. He would do anything to get rid of this uncomfortable, aching feeling in his chest. It was like he couldn’t breathe. He continued to scratch harder as his hands began to turn red and inflamed. 

“Hey, hey, hey. Don’t do that, you’re gonna end up hurting yourself.” Arturo said as he inched a little bit closer to him. Close enough to the point where he could gently grab his hands and rub them softly. 2D tried to pull away but Arturo continued to gaze up into his deep dark eyes, still holding on to his now bright red hands. “Can you tell us why they’re looking for you? We just wanna help you, Stuart.”

Slowly but surely, 2D stopped trying to scratch himself so Arturo could simply hold both of his hands. 

“I mean, unless you did something really bad before. But you don’t look like the type of guy to commit murder or something.” Arturo gave out a nervous laugh, hoping it would ease some of the newly built tension but when 2D stayed completely silent for a good solid moment, everyone in the room suddenly felt another new weight being added to the rest of their shoulders. “W-Wait, you didn’t actually—“ 

The singer shook his head with tears streaming down his face once again.

“No... I just had to get away.” 

* * *

“...And then I just panicked! So I tried to slap his hand away from me but then I ended up accidentally smacking him in the face.” Ace sat there on the big pleather armchair as he continued to recount his story to Snake who was now giving him a new tattoo. He seemed to be a lot calmer than he was several minutes ago. He didn’t know why but just talking with his old buddy Snake made him feel really comfortable sometimes. It’s like all of his worries just suddenly went away. Doesn’t mean that he didn’t feel horrible about what happened earlier with 2D but it was comforting to know that Snake was still a shoulder he could lean on for support. 

“You’re starting to move again.” Snake said, concentrating highly on the detail of their newest art piece. “I’m still listening, you just need to stop moving around as much. I’m almost done.” 

“You think Big Billy’s gonna be really mad when he finds out we messed with his equipment?” 

“Nah. If he knows I’m working with it and not you, I’m sure we’ll be fine.” 

Ace gave brief chuckle as he turned his head back at the ceiling, trying his best not to move too much. He had almost forgotten about times like these where he and his best friend would do nothing but draw on each other’s arms with just an embroidery needle and some ink. But after everything that happened to the two of them after the past twenty something years, he was surprised that Snake even continued to stick around with him. But their relationship aside, 2D wasn’t like Snake. Ace didn’t have a chance to fuck up this time in his mind. 2D was clearly put through the wringer thanks to Murdoc and he knew that. Yet he still managed to screw that up somehow. After a moment of some more contemplation, his smile began to fade as he let out an exhausted sigh. 

“I really fucked up didn’t I..?” He muttered, looking down at his hands with a tinge of sadness coming back into his eyes. His best friend just snickered back in response before speaking.

“Pfft..! What? Nah, bro. It sounds like you just had another one of your panic attacks.” Snake reassured. 

Ace’s eyes went wide as he looked back at Snake inquisitively. 

“Wait, really? You sure about that?” 

“Yeah, man. I mean, I’ve seen you during your episodes before—“ 

“No, I know that but the last time I had one this bad was like... I don’t know, years ago? And I’ve been on medication ever since, so how could I still be having these?” Ace argued, trying to still wrap his head around the thought. “H-Have I had other episodes recently, Snake?”

Snake just shrugged their shoulders as they continued to tattoo his arm. 

“Well...” They hesitated slightly. “You did have quite a few of them when you were waiting to get an answer from Gorillaz about being the new bassist while Murdoc was gone.” 

“Well, yeah but that was over a year ago—“ 

“And you had another one when you found out you were going to meet them at the Kentucky Derby.” 

“Alright but—“ 

Before he could even say anything else, his dear friend Snake only continued. 

“Then you called me from a club in Barcelona while you were high, crying about how you didn’t know what to say to 2D.” 

“Okay—“ 

“Then when you called me from your hotel room in Tokyo and you said you had another one at—“ 

“Okay, so I’ve had a lot of them!” Ace finally managed to say. “I just need to change my meds again, that’s all. Christ on bike, Snake...” 

The parrot nosed individual let out a small laugh while shaking their head. 

“You asked, man. I’m just telling you what I’ve seen.” Snake said quite as-a-matter-of-factly. “By the way, why haven’t you told 2D that you have a crush on him yet?” 

“Oh my god, Snake!” Ace covered up his face in embarrassment, causing Snake to quickly yank the tattooing needle away from their friend’s arm. 

“Careful now, I don’t want to poke a vein or something.” 

“Why are we talking about this now?!” Ace shouted, now beginning to blush. 

“Because you’ve been talking about him non-stop since you got back.” Snake gleamed. “Besides, from all of the texts you’ve shown me, he clearly likes you, dude.” 

The pointy nosed man slowly peeked through his hands and gave his friend a look of suspicion. 

“And how do I know you’re not just yanking my chain over here?” Ace asked with an inquisitive expression. Snake let out an audible groan of frustration out of their poor bestie’s naivety. 

“Are you kidding me?! Bruh, give me your phone right now.” 

“What, why?” Ace protested, now letting his friend fully see his lobster red face. 

“Just give it here and I’ll show you what I mean.” Snake then quickly grabbed Ace’s phone and proceeded scroll through some of his Discord messages. 

“Hey!” 

“See?” Snake cynically pointed out. “C’mon. Who texts that late at night if they’re not interested in someone? Also look how many pictures he’s sent you asking if he looks alright.” 

Ace only proceeded to roll his eyes at them, a small smirk coming across his face. 

“You really know how to slay me, y’know that?” He said, turning his head away from his former costar. Snake simply flashed him a toothy smile before going back to creating their masterpiece. 

“Glad I can still make you laugh, Copular.” Snake said cheekily, winking at him before giving Ace his phone back. “Don’t worry so much about it. He’s not gonna be mad at you forever.” 

After that the two of them just sat there in a brief moment of silence while Snake put the finishing touches on Ace’s new tattoo. Once they were finally done, they wrapped it up in cling film, taped it, and wiped off the sweat from their brow. Ace looked down at the finished product to find a beautiful arrangement of melon buds, melon leaves, vines, and a two tiny bees coming out of a flower pot. It was clearly drawn very carefully and smoothly, the hatching on the leaves and flower pot especially made it pop in Ace’s mind. He couldn’t help but beam at it. 

“Goddamn, Snake..!” Ace remarked happily. Snake began to chuckle as they began to put the equipment away and clean up. 

“So I’m guessing you like it?” 

“I fucking love it.” Ace then quickly got of the armchair and walked up to his friend, wrapping his arms over his shoulders. “We should really do this more often.”

“I’m fine with that,” Snake shot back, grinning wildly. “as long as you don’t tattoo my body and just stencil it.” 

“Aw, c’mon! Just lemme it do it once.” 

“Fuck no, amigo. You got such wobbly hands.” 

Ace let out a small giggle as he took out a marker from one of the shelves and sat Snake down in the armchair. 

“Okay, then just the stencil.” He said with a cheeky smile. Snake could only roll their eyes. 

“Umm... I don’t think that’s how you make a stencil, Ace.” They said, still chuckling. “We have transfer fax paper in here. Well, at least I think we do.” 

“We’re fine. Now, where do you want it?” Ace asked as he quickly popped the marker cap off. Snake then extended their arm towards him, pointing at the back of their hand. “Alright cool.” 

Soon Ace got to work on Snake’s little stencil with his blue marker. He slowly and surely tried to draw a tiny snake wrapping around a flower with as much control as possible. After a little while of messing up, wiping off the mistakes, and finally getting back on track, the two of them began to start talking seriously again. 

“So anyway, as I was saying earlier...” Snake stated as they stared at their hand, watching Ace really trying his damnedest to keep his hands from wobbling. “I think all you need to say to 2D is that you had a panic attack because you had a fight with the old man.” 

“Murdoc’s not that old, Snake.” Ace remarked defensively. “He’s only fifty-four.” 

“Okay, senile then.” Ace could only shake his head at Snake and sigh. 

“Why do you hate him so much? He never did anything to you.” He barked. His friend only shrugged their shoulders and began to frown.

“I dunno. He’s always seemed pretty sketchy to me. Especially when he came to CN that one time and cussed out your mom. I mean, I get it but still... pretty fucking weird.” 

Ace’s hands started to get clammy the more Snake continued to utter his name. He could feel himself beginning to get wobbly again so he stopped drawing on their hand for a moment before starting back up again. 

“By the way,” Snake recalled. “why did he even come over there to talk to you in the first place?” 

By this point, Ace slammed down the marker, causing Snake to only jump in their seat. 

“There, your stencil’s done. Can we go back now..?” He mumbled, his breath slowly growing more and more shaky. As he was about to walk out the door, Snake quickly got up to grab his hand. Eyeing their best friend up and down in concern. 

“H-Hey. Ace, are you alright? I didn’t mean to make you upset if that’s what’s going on.” Snake pointed out, worryingly as their fingers traced his thumb in comfort. 

“No, Snake. I just...” Ace stared at them softly with a slight tinge of fear in his eyes as he began to feel his joints begin to tighten from anxiety. “I don’t want to talk about Murdoc right now, alright? Let’s just go back and get this situation over with.” 

Snake could only look at him in growing concern as they watched their buddy march out the room and into the lobby. Something definitely happened to him that night but they just didn’t know exactly what. They then followed him into the lobby and saw how Ace was waiting at the front door for them, seemingly eager to go back out there. 

“Umm... Ace. You know I’m always here if you wanna talk, right?” 

Ace only continued to stare at Snake silently before looking back down at the floor. After a moment or two he finally walked up to Snake and hugged him tightly. 

“I’m not really supposed to talk anyone about this but... you have to promise me you won’t tell anyone else about what I’ve told to you.” 

Then with a nervous look in their eyes, glancing back at Ace’s, Snake sighed as they hugged their friend back in confirmation. 

“I promise.” 

* * *

“So you’re actually 2D from Gorillaz?!” Grubber shouted as he looked at 2D with big puppy eyes. The singer smiled meekly as he spoke. 

“Yep. W-Wait, are you all from the show?”

“Yeah! Billy, Grubber, Snake, Ace and I were all part of the Gangreen Gang.” Arturo exclaimed happily. He went around and hugged both Billy and Grubber, practically showing off in front of 2D. “And Fuzzy just played as himself.” 

Fuzzy smiled proudly to himself while nodding. 

“Mm-hm, that’s right. Oh, I remember how excited Ace was that he was gonna see y’all. Especially you, 2D.” The pink hillbilly laughed. “God, he got so upset when he found out you weren’t coming.” 

2D looked him slightly shocked. He didn’t really expect to hear the fact that Ace knew about him that long ago. When he was probably still a kid no less. 

“H-He what..?” 

“Oh yeah!” Fuzzy said, quite casually. “I remember when he and the Gangreen Gang were still in high school, er, besides Arturo. He was still in middle school back then and Ace turned twenty at that point. But anyways, he used to gush about you a lot. And I mean a lot. Hell, I think you were the reason he came out as bisexual in the first place...”

“Really?” 2D’s eyes went wide as he tried to process Fuzzy’s last sentence. He had no idea that Ace even liked him romantically in the first place, especially for that long. _Did I really have that much of an impact on him?_ He thought. _Wait, was this just a one-time celebrity crush type kind of thing or has Ace had feelings for me this entire time?_ Only more questions began to flood his brain as he continued to dwell on it. But as much as he tried to push those thoughts out of his mind to try and chalk it up as nothing more than him simply overthinking or that he needed to remind himself the reason why he ran out of that man’s apartment in the first place, his gut wouldn’t let it go. Just the overwhelming thought of Ace being even remotely attracted to him made him feel... well, uneasy. Not in a bad way exactly, but it felt a little more like his adrenaline was kicking into high gear. It did make him feel somewhat excited that Ace would’ve liked him. He didn’t really know why though. It wasn’t they knew each other for a very long time like he did with Murdoc. But it would be quite ironic considering the fact that 2D came out because of him in the first place. If Ace truly came out as bi because he liked him, even all that time ago. It definitely came full circle. As he continued to think about it, 2D could already feel his face beginning to heat up, but he was determined to not let anyone notice. 

“Nah,” Grubber blurted out. “I’m pretty sure Snake was it. Didn’t they fuck on the catwalk once—?” 

“Grubber, let’s not talk about that.” Billy quickly interjected, covering the man’s mouth. Grubber at that point was only left snickering while 2D stared at the two of them both confused and slightly terrified at what Grubber was about to reveal. Fuzzy only chuckled before looking back at 2D with an almost somber look in his beady little eyes. 

“By the way, kiddo. I’m sorry for scaring you like that.” He apologized softly. “I didn’t realize you went through so much.” 

“It’s okay, really.” 2D said. “You didn’t know.” 

“That reminds me,” Arturo mumbled to himself before looking back at the singer. “what even happened between you and him? Y’know with—“ 

As soon he noticed the soft, saddened look in 2D’s eyes, Arturo knew that he had messed up. But since the question was already up in the air, he wanted to make sure that he would present the question a little more lightly. 

“Th-That thing that, umm... happened earlier. That... f-fight with Ace?” 

Everyone then turned to look at 2D curiously, seemingly desperate for an answer. The blue haired man just sat there with a shy glance before turning his face to the floor. 

“It was just an argument, that’s all.” He said in monotonous tone. 

The rest of the Gangreen Gang looked back at each other, confused. Billy began to walk towards 2D, putting a hand on his shoulder in order to comfort him. 

“Listen, we just wanna make sure everything’s alright. We’re worried, y’know? Not just about Ace since he’s our bro, but we’re worried about what’s going on with the both of you. And if anything’s wrong, we’ll make sure get the help you guys need. Okay?” 

“Does this have something to do with why you left, Pot?” Fuzzy interjected, now looking directly at an uncomfortable looking 2D. By this point, he just sighed before turning to Fuzzy with an icy glare. 

“First of all, please don’t call me that. Secondly, to answer your question, yes and no.” 2D said as he sunk into his seat. “I don’t really know what happened during our fight, but all I do know is that I saw Ace crying, I asked him what was wrong, he told me to leave him alone, and when I tried to comfort him he slapped me. It just brought me too many memories of someone that I knew, okay? This isn’t really something I’d like to talk to talk about.” 

As soon as he said that, 2D noticed how the Gang suddenly fell awkwardly silent. Almost as if something like this had happened before with Ace. Now exceedingly curious, he decided to question them. 

“What?” 

“Oh Christ...” Grubber mumbled out. “Umm... How do we put this?” 

The other three members of the Gangreen Gang continued to look back at each other nervously. 

“Okay, first. Has Ace told you anything about his past?” Arturo asked anxiously. 2D shrugged. 

“I mean, sort of. He’s told me about his time on PPG, his time during the reboot, music experience, some bits and pieces about his sex life—“ 

“Was there anything specific?” Billy interjected. “L-Like anything about his home life or..?” 

“‘Home life?’” 2D repeated, looking at him both confused and intrigued. He couldn’t remember anything specific that Ace told him during their conversations over the past year or so. Ace probably did tell him something but knowing how his memory is about as reliable as a goldfish’s, that doesn’t really say much. He heard Fuzzy give a long drawn out sigh as if he was beginning to get more impatient with the Gang. 

“You’re killing me here.” Fuzzy announced quite dramatically. “Why do y’all have to be so goddamn sensitive when comes to this shit? We all know what happened to him. I’m sorry, but I just don’t get why we all have dance around it like we’re on some fucking carousel in the summertime.” 

“Well, Stuart clearly doesn’t know.” Arturo said defensively. “I’m sure Ace had a pretty good reason not to tell him. I wouldn’t want people knowing certain things about me either.” 

“Y’all are weird. If I talked to somebody for... uhh...” Fuzzy paused in thought realizing that he didn’t know how long the singer and his former coworker had known each other. “Hey 2D, how long have you guys been together?” 

2D let out a nervous chuckle as a soft pinkish hue began to flood his cheeks. “Oh! W-We’re not a couple or anything. We’ve only known each other for about a year and a half.” 

Fuzzy gave him a upraised eyebrow, nodding silently as he slowly turned back to the other three green men. 

“Uh-huh... Well, regardless. If I was comfortable enough to share parts of my sex life to someone, I would’ve probably told them about my struggles too. So if Ace didn’t tell him, then he’s a fucking coward. Especially if he didn’t tell it to someone that he cared so much about.” As soon as the rest of the Gangreen Gang tried to defend their friend, Fuzzy put his hand up to raise yet another point. “I won’t tell him about what exactly happened but I will tell 2D why I think Ace did what he did. Alright?” 

Fuzzy then paid all of his attention to the worried little singer sitting in front of him, a small sassy smile appearing on his chubby face. But before he could say anything, the store’s door’s charm chimed loudly. Everyone turned around to find Snake and Ace returning back from what seemed to be a very emotional conversation by just the expressions that were plastered onto their faces. As they walked into the store, 2D immediately stood up and raced towards him. 

“Ace!” 2D cried. Ace looked over to the singer and softly smiled, pulling the tall lanky man into a tight hug. To which 2D quickly reciprocated. “I-I’m so sorry about what I did. I didn’t mean to—“ 

“No, no, ‘D. It’s okay. You’re fine.” Ace softly reassured. “I get why you were scared. I got scared too.” 

“So what happened?” 2D asked inquisitively as he pulled away slightly from Ace’s embrace. “What got you so upset..?” 

“W-Well...” Ace looked straight into 2D’s pitch black eyes as he tried to muster up the courage and get the words out before biting down on bottom lip and anxiousness. “Murdoc gave me a phone call before you came to see me downstairs.” 

“What?!” 

“I talked to him for a little while and I found out that he snuck through our messages on your laptop back home.” 

2D suddenly felt his stomach beginning to ache like he swallowed some enormous rock. His face became pale at the idea that Murdoc even managed to find out where he was so quickly. But despite his heart rate beginning to climb, he let Ace continue. 

“I then found out that the police only said you were missing because the band had some big concerns about your mental health and not only that but Murdoc even started recording me because he didn’t believe what I was saying.” 

“But...” 2D muttered. “Please tell me you didn’t tell him exactly where we were, did you?” 

“Oh god, no.” Ace replied. “I made sure to give him as little details as possible.” 

This caused the singer to relax somewhat before hugging him again. 

“Alright, good. So, what do we do now..?”

“I don’t know, Stu.” Ace confessed quietly as he hugged 2D as tight as he could. “That’s why I panicked. Because if they did manage to find us, I could get arrested for kidnapping and you could get deported...” 

2D hugged him back just tightly, gently rubbing up and down his back. 

“Ace...” 

“I-I’m so sorry,” Ace began to mumble out, trying to not let the poor blue-haired man hear him choke up. “I really fucked it up, ‘D.” 

“Hold up.” Fuzzy intervened, standing up while looking at his smartphone. Once all the information was soaked back into his brain, Fuzzy quickly cranked his neck towards Grubber. “Hey, Grubber. Turn on the TV.”   


Grubber nodded and quickly tried to set up the TV in the corner as the rest of the Gangreen Gang began to swarm around it in curiosity. This caused 2D turn his head towards Fuzzy in exhaustion. 

“Fuzzy, I don’t think now’s the time to turn on the news right now.” 2D said tiredly. 

“But it’s about you.” Fuzzy explained, giving him a slight side eye. “It seemed pretty important to me.” 

The TV soon sparked to life, showing singer’s once young and naive face plastered on the screen as the news anchor continued the report on his ‘disappearance.’ 2D looked up at the TV, watching in silent horror, awaiting what exactly was going to happen to him now. 

“...Founder and bassist of Gorillaz, Murdoc Niccals has just released a public apology on Twitter regarding his questionable and controversial actions during the tail end of a ten hour long livestream, to which he revealed the private conversations between two of his band mates— former bassist, Ace D. Copular and lead singer, Stuart ‘2D’ Pot, who was deemed missing by the City of London Police late yesterday evening.” The news anchor stated. 

Everyone inside the store could only watch alongside a mystified looking 2D as the report only continued to unfold. By this point, Ace began to look up at the screen, terrified of what could happen to the singer because of him. 

“Well, it seems like that is no longer the case for Mr. Pot,” The reporter announced. “since shortly after Niccals released his apology, the City of London Police announced that they are stopping their search after finding evidence that the star was indeed ‘not in any danger with anyone or himself’ but was just spending time in Los Angeles to visit his friends. They said, ‘We want to apologize to Mr. Stuart Pot and his friends or family members for any fear and confusion we might’ve caused during the course of this investigation. It is our jobs to protect and serve our community with the truth, not to divide them with falsehoods and gossip...’” 

In that moment, it was as if a spark lit up inside that little 7-Eleven. Soon the cheers from the Gangreen Gang began to drown out the sound of TV, quickly surrounding both Ace and 2D in a collective embrace. All of them jumped around and rejoiced, especially Ace. Finally relieved by the fact now he wouldn’t be walking on eggshells. He then grabbed 2D’s still shocked face, smiling gleefully. 

“Oh my gosh, Stu..! Do you know what this means?!” He shouted. 

“Wh-Wha—?” Was the only thing 2D could utter before Ace began to pepper his forehead and neck with little kisses as he hugged him oh so tightly. 

“You’re free, man! You don’t have to worry anymore.” 

“I’m...” 2D tried desperately to let it sink into his mind that he was truly okay but his gut was still dizzy from all of the adrenaline. Once it finally began to register, a happy and relaxed smile finally appeared on his face. “I’m actually free..!” 

Everyone sat there for quite awhile before finally going their separate ways, each feeling a little bit better than they were before. One by one, they left. Most of them chatting through most of the night in celebration. Minutes soon turned into hours before it suddenly got to midnight. After mostly everyone that was in the store before was gone except for Snake and Grubber, who stayed to clean up. 2D and Ace decided to part away from the shop and make their way home. It was weird for 2D knowing that he was finally free, or at least somewhat free. He slightly wondered what Murdoc was going to do him now that the search was over and Ace cut off all contact with him. But for the most part, he pushed that away from the back of his mind and tried to just keep it in the present. Because right now, in this moment, he was the most comfortable he had ever been in a long time and he had Ace to thank for that. In his eyes, if it weren’t for Ace doing what he did, Murdoc could’ve done something much worse to him. Strangely however, 2D began to experience something bizarre stirring up inside him. Something that he hadn’t felt in a long long time, since he was in his twenties. The more he thought about Ace and what he did before this very moment, the singer’s chest began to pound. He didn’t even think that he could fall this hard for someone since he had one of his first experiences back in 2004. But he was wrong. But no matter his thoughts about him, 2D certainly didn’t want these new found feelings to interfere with their friendship. Not only that but if he really did want to be with Ace that badly, he couldn’t just jump into this one like he did with Murdoc all those years ago. Especially when the main reason he even came to the States in the first place was because he wanted to find himself again. His own mental health should come first, right? There was no way he could be in a relationship right now in his mind. 

“‘D.” Ace said, getting 2D out of his train of thought. “You ready to go?”

2D looked back at the bassist’s soft and kind eyes, smiling at him softly before getting off the ground.

“Oh, sorry.” He commented, putting on the beanie that Ace brought him a little while ago. “I spaced out for a moment there.” 

Ace chuckled as he watched the blue haired bloke get up and practically waddle towards him. 

“Yeah, I can tell.” 

Ace then held his arm out for the singer to take, to which 2D humbly took they began to make their way to the parking lot. Once they walked out the door, 2D laid his head on the young man’s shoulder, sighing peacefully with a heart full of hope. 

“You did a good thing today, Copular. You really, really did.” 

Ace smiled softly wrapping one arm around him. 

“No problem.” 

But as they both were about to get in Ace’s car, Snake quickly ran out from the store and shouted towards them. 

“Hey! You forgot something!” 

“We did?” 2D inquired. He didn’t think he forgot anything this time. 

Ace inquisitively walked over to Snake, curious as to what he might’ve left behind. 

“What is it?” 

Snake then presented the two men with a couple cases of the store’s beer, smiling gleefully as they lifted over to the backseat of Ace’s car. 

“Just wanted to give these as a gift to you guys. Don’t worry, I already paid for it.” 

2D quickly came to Snakes aid, helping them lift the cases into the car, smiling just as happily. 

“Snake...” Ace said in a mixture of both appreciation and frustration that Snake paid for it all. “C’mon you didn’t have to—“

“Nah, nah. It’s fine, man!” Snake insisted. “Besides, I think you guys might need it after all the stress you both went through tonight.” 

“How did you manage to read my mind?” 2D asked. “I was like, just thinking about going out to a bar or something!” 

Snake laughed as they walked back into the store. 

“Have fun!” 

Ace could only roll his eyes before waving his friend goodbye and starting up his car shouting, 

“Thank you!” 

And with that, they drove back to the apartment with two whole cases of ice cold beer and a brand new future awaiting them. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! I’m sorry this took so long to put out. I’ve been having a lot of trouble lately both mentally and emotionally so I haven’t been able to really get this chapter to it’s absolutely best. But I’m feeling a little better now and just getting out of my writer’s block so here it is. I hope all of you like it and I swear I will try and get chapters done a lot quicker next time!


End file.
